From the Postdoctoral Perspective

Lisa Jenkins

Washington University in St. Louis

In the last postdoctoral perspective, I urged students at all levels to examine an article (The Journal of NIH Research, 1996, Vol. 8) which provided information about how to apply for federal grant money for research. However, federal grants are only one source of funding for students.

State and local government agencies often provide small grants to individuals conducting research in the community. Typically, these grants involve smaller amounts of money and are shorter in term than federal grants, but are often easier to obtain. Information about these types of grants can be found at your college or university funding office or at your local library. For some states, limited information can also be found under Community Foundations on the Grantmaker Information web cite, http://fdncener.org/grantmaker/contents.html.

Public and private corporations as well as profit and nonprofit organizations provide an enormous amounts of money for research each year. The amount and term of such grants varies a great deal from corporation to corporation. Information about these grant opportunities can also be obtained from you local college or university, at the Grantmaker Information web cite, and/or at the TRAM web cite, http://tram.rice.edu/TRAM/.

Good luck in your search, and if you have questions or comments on funding, you can email me at ljenkins@artsci.wustl.edu.

To direct comments about the information contained in these pages, please write to marsiske@ufl.edu