Grants and Writing Resources for City University of New York

In October 2026, a Ph.D. candidate in Criminal Justice at the CUNY Graduate Center won the Harry Frank Guggenheim Foundation's 2026 HFG Emerging Scholars Award, a $25,000 prize for doctoral candidates in their final year of writing. Her dissertation compares completed school shootings with planned attacks that were stopped. The Graduate Center's own Dissertation Fellowships range from $5,000 to $25,000 and go to students advanced to candidacy who expect to finish during the award year.

Dissertation Fellowships at the Graduate Center

One competition covers the Graduate Center Dissertation Fellowships. Awards range from $5,000 to $25,000 and go to students advanced to candidacy (Level III) who expect to finish during the award year. One application puts you in the running for more than two dozen named funds, from the Helaine Newstead Dissertation Fellowship in the Humanities to the Mina Rees Dissertation Fellowship in the Sciences. Some special-focus awards, such as the Ralph Bunche and Leon Levy Center for Biography fellowships, have to be selected on the form.

Students whose work draws on the Schomburg Center's collections can apply for the CUNY/Schomburg Archival Dissertation Fellowship. It pays $25,000 plus in-state tuition for a residency year with seminars and a spring public lecture. It's open to any humanities or social sciences field, with a preference for interdisciplinary work on the African Diaspora.

Research Funding Before the Dissertation

The Provost's Office runs the Early Research Initiative for Level II and III doctoral students. It helps with grant writing and external applications and held a 2026 ERI Conference. Its internal funding list includes the Doctoral Student Research Grant, up to $1,500 for students in years two through six. Its $4,000 summer awards include the Provost's Pre-Dissertation Research Fellowship and archival fellowships at the Morgan Library and Museum.

Digital projects have their own track. The same list carries the Provost's Digital Innovation Grants ($500 to $3,000) and the Graduate Center Digital Fellows Program. The Graduate Center also posts more funding on its Current Fellowship Opportunities page. That page lists the Advanced Science Research Center's Graduate Student Interdisciplinary Seed Grant, up to $10,000 for doctoral students at the Graduate Center or City College.

Presenting Research

Graduate Center doctoral and master's students who present at professional or academic conferences can apply to the Office of Student Affairs for Conference Presentation Support. It's a one-time reimbursement of up to $300, awarded by lottery.

Undergraduates have campus-based routes. The Graduate Center's CUNY Pipeline Program prepares CUNY undergraduates from underrepresented groups for Ph.D. study with a year of monthly colloquia and a summer institute, ending in a research project. Community colleges including Kingsborough and BMCC run the CUNY Research Scholars Program, which pairs students with faculty mentors for a year of research. At Kingsborough, CRSP scholars present in fall and spring and at a CUNY-wide symposium. At BMCC, CRSP pays $5,000 over the year for 400 hours of mentored research.

Help With Writing

The GC Writing Center serves current and past graduate students. Writing fellows give one-on-one consultations online and in person on anything from dissertation chapters to grant proposals, and the center runs online workshops. Its Groups and Clinics page lists a weekly Writing Cohort that writes together on Zoom and an Accountability Group for setting and reporting weekly goals.

Format and deposit questions go to the Graduate Center's Dissertation Office. Librarians at the Mina Rees Library will consult on format and citation. Library deposit is the last requirement before the degree is conferred.

Where Theses Are Published

Since 2014, every Graduate Center dissertation, thesis, and capstone project has gone into the Graduate Center's Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects collection in CUNY Academic Works. The library's 2024-25 year in review counted 421 deposits, including 303 doctoral dissertations. About 53% were open to read right away; authors can set an embargo of up to two years on the rest.

For a final edit before submission, our PhD-level editors work with CUNY students at every level. See our City University of New York dissertation and thesis editing and City University of New York essay editing pages, or write to editors@editorsforstudents.com.