Awards for Faculty at Tribal Colleges and Universities

The Awards for Faculty at TCUs funding opportunity is cancelled for FY2026 and is not accepting applications.

The Awards for Faculty at TCUs program strengthens the humanities at Tribal Colleges and Universities (TCUs) by encouraging and expanding humanities research opportunities for individual faculty and staff members. Awards provide the individual recipient with time to write, conduct research, and pursue other project-related activities.

This program offers applicants flexibility in project outcomes and award periods. NEH welcomes proposals in all fields of the humanities, such as literature, history, philosophy, religion, and history, criticism and theory of the arts. Awards support individuals pursuing scholarly research that is of value to humanities scholars, students, and/or general audiences.

Eligible projects for all Awards for Faculty programs include:

• research in primary and secondary materials leading to the development of books, monographs, peer-reviewed articles, e-books, digital projects and resources, translations with annotations or a critical apparatus, critical editions, or other scholarly resources
• research related to institutional or community goals or interests, such as projects that draw on archival collections, collection and interpretation of oral histories, or the development of materials in support of culture or language preservation and revitalization
• research leading to the improvement of a single existing undergraduate course, including the development of humanities resources (for example, oral histories, identification and preparation of archival sources, or newly compiled historical or literary collections) 
   

In addition, projects funded by the Awards for Faculty at TCUs program may include research that sustains and strengthens tribal languages and/or cultural traditions and supports students and the community, such as:

• research leading to the improvement of an existing graduate course
• research related to tribal or institutional interests, identities, and priorities, such as projects that draw on cultural or institutional archival collections
• the development of materials in support of sustaining, preserving, and revitalizing culture or language
• research and preparation leading to the development of a humanities workshop series for students at the affiliated institution and/or members of the local community. A humanities workshop series must be prepared and led by the awarded individual faculty or staff member and must engage participants with primary sources. Workshops should develop participants’ knowledge and skills with humanities research methodologies, such as the collecting of oral histories, Indigenous research methods, language or linguistic methods, and/or archival research. Applicants should address how many workshops they plan to develop, and around what theme or themes. (Projects must plan for at least three workshops as part of a series.)
• travel to and research in archival or cultural collections with significant holdings in the applicant’s area of expertise or in an area of tribal or institutional priority or interest
   

The Awards for Faculty at TCUs program is open to individual faculty and staff members, including full-time, part-time, adjunct, and retired faculty and staff at TCUs. If retired, applicants must not be affiliated with or employed by another institution at the time of application. Awards support individuals who work between half time and full time on their projects. Projects may be at any stage of development. You may propose to complete your project by the end of the period of performance or you may propose to do so by a later date.

If you are awarded an Awards for Faculty at HBCUs or TCUs fellowship, your institution may be eligible to apply for funding to offset costs associated with your research leave, including funds to offset costs associated with hiring replacement instructors for humanities courses that the Awards for Faculty fellow would normally teach. Please visit Awards for Faculty Institutional Support – HBCUs and TCUs (neh.gov) for full details about this new program.

Note: NEH has moved to a shared payment service operated by the U.S. Department of the Treasury and can no longer deposit funds for awards to individuals into an institutional bank account. Starting with awards issued August 2024, NEH will make payment to a personal bank account only.

What’s new for 2025:

• The Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO) has been combined this year to include three programs (Awards for Faculty at HBCUs, Awards for Faculty at HSIs, and Awards for Faculty at TCUs). Please read the NOFO carefully and follow the guidance for the program to which you are applying.
• Applicants at TCUs are eligible for additional project types, as specified in the NOFO. In particular, please see the newly described “Humanities Workshop Series,” as well as the recommended attachment 6.
• Section D2, “Content and Form of the Application Submission,” has been updated to include additional attachments in 2025, and previously required attachments have in some cases been reordered. Please see, in particular, attachments 6 through 9, which previously were combined in a single attachment. Read carefully and follow the requirements.
• The application component table more clearly indicates which attachments are required, recommended, or conditionally required.
• If you are proposing a digital project, please see the new strongly recommended attachment 9 (“Data sample and data management and sharing plan”).
• Program staff will only review draft narratives and work plans submitted by applicants affiliated with eligible institutions that are not classified by the Carnegie Classification system as “Doctoral Universities: Very High Research Activity.” Please see the Notice of Funding Opportunity (Section D.4) for additional information.
• Funding restrictions regarding the preparation or revision of textbooks have been modified.
• Learn about NEH's implementation of recent Executive Orders.

Recorded Webinar

Optional Draft Narrative and Work Plan review: If you are at an eligible institution, submit your narrative and work plan to the facultyawards@neh.gov email box by 11:59 Eastern on February 14, 2025 to receive feedback from NEH staff. Follow the guidance in the NOFO, Section D.

Live Q&A: The Live Q&A has been postponed. Check back here for updates.