Internal Applications Due: Monday, November 10, 2025 at noon CST

The Mellon Foundation’s Higher Learning program has invited the University of Minnesota Twin Cities to nominate a candidate for the 2025 New Directions Fellowship competition. 

These fellowships provide up to $300,000 for faculty in the humanities and humanistic social sciences who received their doctorates between 2013 and 2019. The goal of the competition is to support the evolution and expansion of humanities disciplines by investing in the intellectual range and productivity of mid-career faculty. Fellows undertake systematic training outside their fields of specialization to acquire the competencies required for advanced cross-disciplinary research—research that goes beyond traditional boundaries and offers innovative and effective ways of bringing humanistic knowledge to bear on societal challenges. 

The University of Minnesota may submit only one nominee. The Institute for Advanced Study (IAS) will coordinate the University’s internal review, selection, and endorsement process.

Overview of Process & Deadlines

• Step 1: Submit a draft application to the IAS via InfoReady. Refer to the InfoReady form for instructions. Applications must be submitted to the IAS via InfoReady by Monday, November 10, 2025 at noon CST. The IAS will coordinate the faculty committee that will review applications and select the nominee.
   
• Step 2: Internal applicants receive notification by November 21, 2025.
   
• Step 3: Selected nominee submits proposal to the Mellon Foundation with IAS assistance. The nominated proposal is due to University of Minnesota Sponsored Projects Administration (SPA) by Tuesday, December 9 at 9:00 a.m. to meet the Mellon Foundation deadline of December 11, 2025 at 2:00 p.m. CST. 

Please be aware that the Mellon Foundation occasionally updates requirements in the course of an application process. We will update this page as necessary. Applicants should check back before submitting their application to the IAS.

Rationale and Description

Serious interdisciplinary research often requires established scholars to pursue formal, substantive, and methodological training in addition to the PhD and outside their areas of formal expertise. The New Directions program is intended to enable scholars-teachers to work on problems that interest them most, at an appropriately advanced level of sophistication. In addition to facilitating the work of individual faculty members, these awards should benefit scholarship in the humanities more generally.

Internal applications will be evaluated using the same criteria to be used by the Mellon Foundation: 

• Originality of the idea, overall significance of the research, and appropriateness of the proposed training program
• The case for the importance of extra-disciplinary training
• Likely ability of the candidate to derive satisfactory results from the training program proposed within a reasonable time frame
• Potential for long-term impact on the candidate’s new or proposed field of study, beyond just the individual’s research
• Record of the nominee, including their history of effectively advancing public-facing and/or community-engaged work

For nominees whose retraining would be a departure from the humanities, their application materials will also be evaluated on whether the proposed interdisciplinary approach would reflect an enduring humanities perspective.

Eligibility

Eligible candidates are faculty members from the Twin Cities campus who were awarded a PhD in the humanities or humanistic social sciences within the last six to twelve years (2013–2019) and whose research interests call for formal training in a discipline other than the one in which they are an expert. Terminal degree holders, such MFAs or EdDs, are ineligible. 

The proposed field of study must be a foray into a new area of intellectual inquiry and not just an enhancement to go further in the primary field. Language study, technical training, or skills acquisition such as GIS mapping do not, by themselves, constitute a new direction.

Budget Information

Fellows will receive: 1) the equivalent of one academic year’s salary, 2) two summers of additional support, each at the equivalent of two-ninths of the previous academic year salary, and 3) tuition, course fees, or equivalent direct costs associated with the fellow’s training program. The Mellon Foundation also expects the fellow’s home institution to use budgetary relief resulting from the award for academic purposes, preferably in the fellow’s department. 

Allowed Expenditures

Grant awards may be used for such purposes such as, but not limited to:

• Salary and standard fringe benefits (including yearly increases)
• Projected training costs (e.g., tuition for the fellow, stipends or honoraria paid to distinguished scholars, community members/elders, etc., under whom an applicant proposes training)
• Project-related travel to support data collection or study (e.g., airfare, mileage reimbursement,parking, etc.)
• Expenses related to attending conferences and professional meetings
• Lodging expenses related to research and training activities for stays of no longer than a semester
• Housing supplements when the projected cost of living in the city where study is to be pursued substantially exceeds the costs incurred when the fellow is working at the home institution
• Specialized equipment and supplies necessary to the undertaking of up to $15,000 total for the grant period (see Disallowed Expenditures for exceptions)

Disallowed Expenditures

Grant awards may not be used for the following:

• Undergraduate tuition, scholarships, financial aid, or study abroad opportunities
• Graduate student tuition for Graduate Research Assistants
• Business class travel
• Indirect, administrative, and occupancy costs
• To stage conferences, symposia, seminars, or events related to the project
• Research assistants, space on the home campus, and basic equipment such as laptops, printers, and voice recorders (the Foundation assumes that these needs will be met by the fellow’s home institution)
• Support for lobbying activity or otherwise support attempts to influence local, state, or federal legislation
• Activities to influence the outcome of any election for public office or to carry on any voter registration drive