Last Updated on September 28, 2022
The Engaged Scholar Initiative: A Texas Model (ESI) aims to honor the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation’s visionary goals of enhancing and further expanding the relationships between public universities and communities in the United States.
The ESI project joins a number of The University of Texas at Austin’s programmes with deep investments in community and a rich history of scholarly and civic collaboration. The Mellon Foundation’s $2 million dollar funding of the project is, in part, a tribute to The University, to institutional interdisciplinary treasures like the Humanities Institute and the Center for Women’s and Gender Studies, and to the numerous luminary scholars, Departments, and Centers housed on campus and in the College of Liberal Arts.
Engagement signifies many things: commitment, attachment, participation, employment, activity, unity, interconnection, and mutuality. The Engaged Scholar Initiative at The University of Texas at Austin celebrates interdisciplinary research as a dynamic and evolving conversation about humanity and society in the Twenty-First Century. Intellectual alliances, cross-pollinating ideas, renewed and re-imagined partnerships are desired scholarly and communal goals for the present and the future, and will be the undertaking of the graduate and undergraduate ESI fellows. The ESI Fellows are mutual celebrants of the world of knowledge, culture, history, politics, ethics, the arts and languages, and the imagination. The ESI project aspires to amplify the educational resources available to the Ph.D. and undergraduate fellows beyond the parameters of their traditional research disciplines, in order to increase the benefits to the scholars and the communities in which they work and live.
Eligibility
- Applicant should have a minimum GPA of 3.2;
- Junior or Senior class standing by Fall 2022;
- Preference for applicants who are College of Liberal Arts students majoring in Humanities or Humanistic Social Science disciplines;
- Preference for applicants without other concurrent major research fellowships.
Expectations
- A commitment to creative and risk-taking research; an inclination toward affiliation and translation; a vibrant sense of civic and intellectual engagement; and a shared endeavor to make public-facing scholarship a mission of generosity and conviction.
Application
This application calls for the following materials:
- ESI Undergraduate Fellowship Application questions
- ESI Essay (limit: 2 pages, double-spaced, 1” margins)
- Resume (limit: 1 page)
- Sample Paper: scholarly essay written for a class at UT Austin
- The name of a UT Austin professor or instructor who will be asked to write a Letter of Recommendation if the Applicant is selected for interview
For more information, visit Mellon Engaged Scholar Initiative.
Deadline: October 2, 2022