Center for Dewey Studies Essay Award | Center for Dewey Studies | SIU

Call for Applications

We are pleased to announce the creation of the Center for Dewey Studies Essay Award and the call for applicants for the 2024-2025 academic year. This award will fund research on John Dewey’s life, work, and legacy. All undergraduate and graduate students at Southern Illinois University Carbondale who will be enrolled during both Fall and Spring of this academic year are eligible to apply. Application deadline is October 10, 2024.

The amount of awards will be granted based on the number of qualified submissions. We intend to distribute $5,000 in total awards.   

Recipients will be encouraged to do research at the Center for Dewey Studies and the Morris Library Special Collections Research Center and will have the option to participate in weekly research group meetings in the Center for Dewey Studies.

Recipients will be required to submit an essay draft based on their research to the Center for Dewey Studies. They will work with Center staff to prepare a collection of their drafts, to be posted on the Center’s website and archived in the OpenSIUC digital archive, by the end of the Spring term after receiving their award. Graduate student awardees will also be encouraged to submit their essay for publication in a major journal within one (1) year of receiving the award and will receive mentoring in the publication process.

To apply for the fellowship, applicants must submit a brief research proposal for a paper on the work of John Dewey. Possible topics for this year’s award include but are not limited to:

1. Topics related to Experience and Nature on the 100th anniversary of its publication.
2. Dewey’s views on academic freedom
3. Dewey on race and colonialism

This essay award is made possible by the generous contribution of Professor Cho-Yee To, one of the first graduate student assistants on the project that became the Center for Dewey Studies.