Scholar Awards: Application Guidelines
Applications and letters of support must be submitted electronically via the JSMF website and are due on Monday, April 7, 2008, no later than 3:59 PM Central Daylight Time. Electronic submission as a single PDF file is the only acceptable format.
It is the responsibility of the sponsoring institution to assure that submitted applications conform to the guidelines below. Please keep in mind that the Scholar Award guidelines were not written arbitrarily. Rather, the guidelines are designed for the applicant’s benefit. The intent of JSMF is to create a simple, fair, straightforward application process. Applications to the JSMF Scholar Awards that fail to meet both the spirit and the letter of the guidelines will be considered an inappropriate response to the posted request for applications and eliminated from funding consideration.
Do not include any documents other than those requested below. Cluttering applications with extraneous attachments will result in JSMF rejecting the entire application prior to review.
Application materials must be submitted in English.
Word limits are set for your benefit. Please follow them carefully to avoid disqualification. Captions and references are not included in the word limit. Please refrain from using lengthy captions, footnotes, endnotes, etc as an end-run around the various word-limits requested.
Before emailing the Foundation with questions, please be sure that you have thoroughly read all the information on the RFP-related webpages. This may require scrolling, as important information may not all appear in a single screen. Please do not email us for clarification about the finer details of the application process (i.e. word limits, font size, margins, format of short-form CV). Follow the guidelines and use your best judgment.
The application consists of:
____1. A completed JSMF cover page (PDF version can be downloaded here). Insert it electronically as the first page of your application file.
____2.) A nominating letter from the CEO (university president's office, dean of a school, or other senior official) of the sponsoring institution stating that the institution, as the official grantee, will administer the award, if made, and agree to waive all administrative charges and indirect costs. If salary funding is being requested, the letter must also document the institutional salary policy and confirm the Scholar Award nominee's available time and effort.
____3. A statement from the nominee, (maximum 750 words) explaining why the Scholar Award nominee is applying for a James S. McDonnell Scholar Award.
____4. An original, unpublished 3500 word essay (Not sure how an essay differs from a proposal? Click here). The first 500 words are devoted to an abstract (or an overview, or summary) suitable for posting on the JSMF website. The remaining 3000 words are used to describe the importance of the research direction the Scholar Award nominee is interested in pursuing.
____5. A brief narrative (no more than 750 words) explaining how the funds will be used. The plan should explicitly address how the funds will be used to advance the ideas described in the essay. A more detailed budget will be requested if and when an award is made.
____6. Two letters of support for the nominee from senior researchers who are not at the Scholar Award nominee's current institution nor the nominee's Ph.D. or post-doctoral advisor. The letters should address, in some detail, the potential of the nominee's research to contribute significantly to the development of knowledge within the nominee's area of research and likelihood that the nominee's research will lead to the generation of new research questions. Letters must be submitted electronically as a PDF file at this link.
____7.) Short-form curriculum vitae for the nominee. (We recommend following the NIH biosketch format. Examples can be found on the NIH website.) This should include a list of current research and pending funding requests.
Important Note: If your proposal is selected for funding from James S. McDonnell Foundation, you will need to submit documentation that your sponsoring institution is a nonprofit institution in accordance with Section 501(c)(3) of the United States Internal Revenue Tax Code or its equivalent for non-US institutions, an Affidavit of Grantee Form. Please check to see whether or not your sponsoring institution’s documentation of tax status is already on file with JSMF (check the list). If it is, your sponsoring institution will only need to submit a letter verifying that this documentation has not changed. If it is not, you may wish to begin the process of obtaining such documentation. This is especially true if your sponsoring institution is not in the United States since it can be especially time-consuming for foreign institutions to gather, prepare and translate the appropriate documentation. Any delays in providing this documentation after a grant has been approved will delay the start date of the grant accordingly.
