We’re thrilled to announce the new Data Science & Society (DSS) Faculty and Student Small Grant Program, aimed at enriching data science in research and education. Open to faculty and students, this initiative offers three funding categories: Faculty Research, Faculty Teaching, and Student Research and Learning. Opportunities include grants for data skills development, research assistance, and specialized resources. We encourage applicants, particularly from non-traditional STEM fields, to advance data science applications in their work. Join us in this innovative endeavor to integrate data science into our academic community!
Covered Activities
Under the Faculty and Student Small Grant Program, we will fund the following opportunities:
Category 1: Faculty research
- Hiring students with data skills
- One-time payment for purchasing datasets and collecting datasets
- Workshops and training for faculty research with data skills
- Workshops and training for student research with data skills
- One-time payment for compute time
- One-time subscription for data analysis software
Category 2: Faculty teaching
- Hiring students as TAs with data skills
- Stipend for developing a module/course with data components
- Workshops and training for faculty research with data skills
- One-course subscription/license for teaching purposes, e.g., Posit
- Reference books for teaching purposes
- One-time guest lecturer honorarium (external to Vassar)
- Outreach and community engagement
Category 3: Student research and learning (Please note that students require a faculty sponsor, please see the Application Details section for more details)
- Funding for class projects
- Travel to workshops or conferences
- Data acquisition costs
- Data analysis software for an Academic Project
- Summer Research (Apply through Ford and URSI)
- Workshops and Training (on-line courses included)
- Payment for Compute Time (e.g. Amazon AWS, etc)
- Funding to work with a faculty member on a project (Find a faculty member to apply!)
Please find the current award amount maximums for each funding category in the table below. Please note that applications with requests above these max award amounts will be rejected.
| Funding Category | Max Award Amount |
| Faculty Research | $3,000 |
| Faculty Teaching | $2,000 |
| Student Research and Learning | $500 |
Application Details
We will prioritize applications from faculty and students in non-traditional STEM fields.
Students, please be aware that your application must be sponsored by a faculty member. This means that you must at minimum have discussed your application and the opportunity you hope to purse with the grant with this faculty member. Faculty members, sponsoring an application only means endorsing the application, it does not imply any time commitment beyond this.
The deadline for applications is the Monday after Fall/Spring Breaks. In the Fall 2024 semester, this is October 21, 2024. For applications below $500, submissions are accepted on a rolling basis.
Award notifications will be sent two weeks after the application deadline for applications $500 and above and within two weeks of the date of submission of the application for applications below $500.
Please apply here.
Questions?
For questions about the program, including whether your proposal falls within the scope of our covered activities, please email DSSgrantprogram@vassar.edu