National Dissertation Award for Research on Poverty and Economic Mobility 2025–2026: Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

No, University of Wisconsin–Madison dissertators are ineligible for funding under this award.

Please resend your application file to irpapply@ssc.wisc.edu as a single PDF and we will update your information with the correct file.

No, the application page limits do not include references/citations. Those can be added at the end and will not be included in the page limit.

Applicants are encouraged to request that their home institution forego or charge minimal indirect costs. However, there is no requirement that home institutions forego indirect costs.

No, there is no set template required for CVs.

Yes, international students are eligible to apply as long as they are attending a U.S. University (other than UW–Madison).

The $25,000 award is paid to your university. Note that home institutions may have restrictions on how the funding is spent and awardees may have to pay taxes on all or part of the funding depending on how it is used. After the award is announced, IRP will work with the awardee and their home institution to develop a detailed budget including determining the amount of indirect costs applied.

To meet the NIH definition of disadvantaged background, the applicant must meet two or more of the following criteria:

1. Were or currently are homeless, as defined by the McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act (Definition: https://nche.ed.gov/mckinney-vento/);
2. Were or currently are in the foster care system, as defined by the Administration for Children and Families (Definition: https://www.acf.hhs.gov/cb/focus-areas/foster-care);
3. Were eligible for the Federal Free and Reduced Lunch Program for two or more years (Definition: https://www.fns.usda.gov/school-meals/income-eligibility-guidelines);
4. Have/had no parents or legal guardians who completed a bachelor’s degree (see https://nces.ed.gov/pubs2018/2018009.pdf);
5. Were or currently are eligible for Federal Pell grants (Definition: https://www2.ed.gov/programs/fpg/eligibility.html);
6. Received support from the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children (WIC) as a parent or child (Definition: https://www.fns.usda.gov/wic/wic-eligibility-requirements).
7. Grew up in one of the following areas: a) a U.S. rural area, as designated by the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) Rural Health Grants Eligibility Analyzer (https://data.hrsa.gov/tools/rural-health), or b) a Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services-designated Low-Income and Health Professional Shortage Areas (qualifying zipcodes are included in the file). Only one of the two possibilities in #7 can be used as a criterion for the disadvantaged background definition.

Students from low socioeconomic (SES) status backgrounds have been shown to obtain bachelor’s and advanced degrees at significantly lower rates than students from middle and high SES groups (see https://nces.ed.gov/programs/coe/indicator_tva.asp), and are subsequently less likely to be represented in biomedical research. For background see Department of Education data at, https://nces.ed.gov/; https://nces.ed.gov/programs/coe/indicator_tva.asp; https://www2.ed.gov/rschstat/research/pubs/advancing-diversity-inclusion.pdf.

If your home country has similar programs to NIH definition of disadvantaged, please describe them. If your country doesn’t have similar programs but you have other ways to indicate that your family was below the poverty level in your country, please provide that information. If you have further questions, you can reach out to IRPApply@ssc.wisc.edu.