Dissertation Grants

Overview

<p class="btn btn-gold"><strong><span>Proposal Deadline Extended to December 15, 2020</span></strong></p> <p>With support from the National Science Foundation, the American Educational Research Association (AERA) Grants Program seeks proposals for Dissertation Grants. The AERA Grants Program provides advanced graduate students with research funding and professional development and training. The program supports highly competitive dissertation research using rigorous quantitative methods to examine large-scale, education-related data. The aim of the program is to advance fundamental knowledge of relevance to STEM policy, foster significant science using education data, and build research capacity in education and learning. Since 1991, this AERA Program has been vital to both research and training at early career stages.</p> <p> The Grants Program encourages the use of major data sets from multiple and diverse sources. It emphasizes the advanced statistical analysis of data sets from the U.S. Department of Education’s National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), the National Science Foundation (NSF), and other federal agencies. The program also supports studies using large-scale international data systems (e.g., PISA, PIRLS, or TIMMS) that benefit from U.S. federal government support. In addition, statewide longitudinal administrative data systems (SLDS) enhanced through federal grants are also eligible for consideration. The inclusion of federal or state administrative information that further expands the analytic capacity of the research is permissible. The thrust of the analysis needs to be generalizable to a national, state, or population or a subgroup within the sample that the dataset represents.</p> <p> The Grants Program is open to field-initiated research and welcomes proposals that:</p> <ol> <li>develop or benefit from advanced statistical or innovative quantitative methods or measures;</li> <li>analyze more than one large-scale national or international federally funded data set, or more than one statewide longitudinal data system (SLDS) or incorporate other data enhancements;</li> <li>integrate, link, or blend multiple large-scale data sources; or</li> <li>undertake replication research of major findings or major studies using large-scale, federally supported or enhanced data.</li> </ol> <p>The Grants Program encourages proposals across the life span and contexts of education and learning of relevance to STEM policy and practice. The research may focus on a wide range of topics, including but not limited to such issues as student achievement in STEM, contextual factors in education, educational participation and persistence (pre-kindergarten through graduate school), early childhood education and development, postsecondary education, and the STEM workforce and transitions. Studies that examine issues of specific racial and ethnic groups, social classes, genders, or persons with disabilities are encouraged.</p>