The Arab Council for the Social Sciences Small Grants Program 2017 - Youth and Spatial Inequalities

Call for applications

The Arab Council for the Social Sciences (ACSS) is pleased to announce the first cycle of its Small Grants Program on the themes of “Youth” and “Spatial Inequalities.” The ACSS Small Grants Program (SGP) is a funding opportunity that aims to support scholars and professionals in the Arab region undertaking four kinds of activities: conference presentations, internships, research on small-scale projects, and organizing workshops.

This competition is funded by grants provided to ACSS by the Ford Foundation, the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida), and the International Development Research Centre (IDRC). Small grants averaging $4,000 will be available to individual Arab researchers and activists residing in the Arab region, whose work focuses on Arab societies. Grants are intended to provide support in a flexible and timely manner.

Program Themes

The two themes of the Small Grants Program are “Youth” and “Spatial Inequalities.” The first topic, Youth, encompasses topics related to youth (defined roughly as those between the ages of 14 and 25) in the Arab world, and issues related to this age group (health, education, family, employment, civic engagement, etc.). The second topic, Spatial Inequalities, focuses on systems, processes, and policies that increase or mitigate unequal access to housing, land, property and services in urban settings.

The dual themes of the program are intended to be broad enough to encourage applications from a wide range of applicants who are working on these issues, while being focused on the nexus between social science theory and praxis in the Arab world. The SGP targets professionals, activists and researchers whose work builds on social science perspectives and methods to achieve change.

The competition aims at canvassing a broad range of proposals from across the region. The proposed activity or research could focus on one or more Arab countries. Applications or plans to do work that adopts or allows the applicant to learn about qualitative or quantitative approaches to the social sciences are encouraged and we are particularly interested in proposals that work at the intersection of both themes of the program.

Program Activities

The aim of the program is to provide small amounts of funding ($4000 average) in a timely manner. The program funds four kinds of activities:

1. Travel grants (to present at/participate in a conference or attend a training workshop)
2. Internship support
3. Research funding (for small-scale pilot studies or dissemination of findings)
4. Organizing workshops

• Nationality/Residence

• Educational Degree

Application Process and Materials 

• Online application form
• Supplemental material specific to your particular funding request (see below)
• CV/Resume of applicant
• Budget request form
• Copy of passport or identification card 

1. Confirmation of presentation/participation at a reputable conference/training workshop (letter or email from the organizers indicating acceptance and whether any expenses will be covered, and a website link to the conference/workshop)
2. Dates of conference/workshop
3. Abstract of Paper (if applicable, maximum 250 words)
4. Full paper to be presented (if applicable/available)
5. Rationale for attending this conference/workshop and how this will advance the applicant’s research agenda/teaching pedagogy/activism/etc. (maximum 250 words)

1. Confirmation of having secured an internship
2. Description of the organization (including a link to its website)
3. Narrative of the internship and how it relates to the themes of the Program (150 words)
4. Letter from internship supervisor indicating learning outcomes for the intern and project(s) to be completed/researched
5. Statement from the applicant on how the internship fits into the applicant’s career/research goals (maximum 500 words)

1. Literature Review and Theoretical Framework (maximum 2 pages)
2. Methodology (maximum 1 page)
3. Activities to be undertaken (e.g. interviews, fieldwork, proposals, etc.)
4. Timeline for pilot study (short-term and limited to a maximum of 6 months)
5. Proposed outputs of pilot study (publication, monograph, policy work, further collaboration, etc.)

1. Background and rationale for workshop (250 words)
2. Proposed format of workshop (including a draft agenda)
3. Intended presenters/audience and location of workshop
4. Innovative approaches to be introduced in this workshop
5. Proposed outputs of workshop (publication, activism, policy work, further collaboration, etc.)

Application Deadlines

• Travel Grants: Quality of paper/presentation, Academic/professional value of conference
• Internships: Design of internship, Quality of learning outcomes, Relationship between internship and professional goals of applicant
• Research Funding: Innovative approaches to research, contribution to knowledge, proposed outputs, potential of the research to lead to larger research projects and new collaborations
• Workshops: Rationale for holding the event including its relationship to ongoing research/activism projects, well thought out criteria for participants invited and audiences targeted, presentation methods and organization of discussions, clear aims and outcomes

• Submit 1 or 2 narrative reports (number of reports will depend on project duration).
• Submit final narrative and financial report within 30 days of the end of the grant term (Financial reports should include the original receipts for all project expenses).
• Produce project related content for the ACSS website (such as project descriptions and profiles of researchers).

This opportunity has expired. It was originally published here:

http://www.theacss.org/pages/sgp