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The Prindle Institute for Ethics seeks to fund projects, events, and scholarship at DePauw University that promote ethical reflection, dialogue, and learning. We are particularly interested in those projects which admit of healthy and reasonable discussion and disagreement, in keeping with our mission. Please review the information below about funding cycles, guidelines for projects, and more.
Overview
Three times each academic year, the Prindle Institute’s Advisory Committee reviews funding proposals for ethics-related projects, events, and scholarship at DePauw. The kinds of projects we fund are widely varied, but must have an affiliated faculty member, staff member, or student as the project lead. Student leads must secure a faculty or staff mentor to serve as a project advisor. Because funding is competitive, priority will be on funding those projects that stand to have the biggest impact on the DePauw community. Examples of funded projects include (but are not limited to):
- Bringing speakers to campus
- Hosting meals and discussions
- Hosting a dialogue group or faculty reading group that meets regularly throughout the year or semester
- Engaging and connecting with the local K-12 community
- Funding for faculty-student collaborative research that has a substantial ethics focus
- Funding the dissemination and/or presentation of student research when the project has a strong tie to ethics
In keeping with the Institute’s mission, we welcome creative approaches to ethics education programming, and encourage prospective grantees not to regard these examples as exhaustive. Please reach out to Associate Director Emily Knuth with any questions or concerns about Project Grant proposals.
2024-2025 Funding Cycles
We offer funds on a cycle model to ensure equitable access to funding opportunities. Projects and events should require funds no earlier than four weeks after the application deadline. If your project does not fit the regular funding cycle, the committee may still consider your proposal, but please explain in your application why your request cannot be made within the regular funding cycle.
Funding Cycles:
Winter Cycle (provides funds for projects in early Spring semester or summer)
- Deadline for proposals: January 15
- Decisions announced: February 7
Spring Cycle (provides funding for projects in summer or early Fall semester)
- Deadline for proposals: April 15
- Decisions announced: May 7
Fall Cycle (provides funds for projects in Fall or early Spring semesters)
- Deadline for proposals: September 27
- Decisions announced: October 7
Project Guidelines
- Many topics and projects have ethical components or implications. To be competitive for Prindle Institute Project Grants, proposals must articulate how a project or event develops and encourages lively, in-depth engagement with relevant ethical issues. This crucially involves acknowledging and considering alternative perspectives and navigating discussions and disagreements respectfully.
- In an effort to ensure that curricular development projects and research projects align with broader guidelines for curricular development and research, the Advisory Committee will review requests for funding such projects in consultation with Academic Affairs. There are often many visiting speakers throughout the academic year at DePauw, so the Advisory Committee may ask that you receive approval from your unit’s Dean before applying for funding for a speaking event.
- If a DePauw student is the project lead for a proposal, they must identify a faculty or staff mentor who will advise in the project implementation and ensure that the student meets the goals of the project and delivers a final project report.
- For more guidance on the task of ensuring that your project engages with its relevant ethical dimensions in a way that makes it competitive for grants, we’ve assembled a document for prospective grantees’ review:
Engaging Ethics: Guidelines for Grantees →