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Cornell China Center Kāng nài ěr zhōngguó zhōngxīn

Apply For China Research Grants (Spring 2020)

Spring 2020 Grant Award Updates

(last updated: June 30, 2020) The Cornell China Center has made Spring 2020 faculty grant awards jointly with Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Zhejiang University, and the Cornell East Asia Program. Project awards are listed on the research page of our website. We also invited a limited number of teams who submitted letters of intent to apply for China Innovation Grant awards to submit full proposals by the end of October 2020. We welcome faculty to contact us with questions or feedback.

In Spring, 2020, the Cornell China Center invited proposals from Cornell faculty for $10,000–100,000 through four types of research grants.

You can download the calls for proposals and the application forms for all of these grant programs here (two files per grant program) and are welcome to apply to more than one grant program. Grants are open to PIs from Ithaca, Weill Cornell Medicine, Cornell Tech, and Cornell AgriTech.

  • China Innovation Grants: multiple awards of up to $100,000 for collaboration with faculty at any university in Mainland China, Hong Kong, Macao, or Taiwan with priority themes this year of health, sustainability, food safety, and cities and the built environment (revised deadline for required 2-page letter of intent to apply: April 2, 2020). 2019 awards are listed here.  China Innovation Grant letter of intent submission form
  • Cornell China Center-East Asia Program Research Fund: $30,000 to be distributed through two to three awards of $10,000–$20,000 for research on Mainland China, Hong Kong, Macao, and Taiwan. Research in the social sciences and humanities will likely get priority. Chinese collaborator welcome but not required. The Cornell China Center and Einaudi Center for International Studies East Asia Program will jointly determine project awards. CCC-EAP Grant submission form
  • Zhejiang University (ZJU-Cornell) Joint Seed Fund: up to five awards of up to $20,000, with ZJU contributing matching awards of 150,000 RMB for their faculty to work on joint projects, all fields of study. ZJU-Cornell Grant submission form
  • Shanghai Jiao Tong University (SJTU-Cornell) Joint Seed Fund: up to five awards of $15,000, with SJTU contributing matching awards of 100,000 RMB for their faculty to work on joint projects, all fields of study. SJTU-Cornell Grant submission form

While the coronavirus outbreak has been affecting travel and exchange activities, the Cornell China Center recognizes the value of building long-term collaborative relationships that tackle complex challenges, design joint initiatives, and grow intercultural understanding. We encourage applicants to plan initial remote work with the potential for travel over time. We look forward to funding innovative research that brings together collaborators to positively impact our world, educate future leaders, and disseminate knowledge for the global public good.

If you missed our grant information sessions or have additional questions, feel free to contact us at chinacenter@cornell.edu or 607-255-0550.

Common Questions:

  • Do I have to have a faculty collaborator in China, Hong Kong, Macao, or Taiwan? --> For many of the grants, yes. For the CCC-EAP grants, a collaborator is welcome but not required.
  • Do I have to assemble an interdisciplinary grant team? --> Not this year. For the 2018-19 grant cycle, we required China Innovation Grant teams to include at least two Cornell co-PIs from different fields. This year, interdisciplinary teams are welcome and may be preferred in the award process but are not required. A strong single-PI China Innovation Grant team proposal is welcome.
  • I missed your grant information sessions and grants Q&A office hours. How can I learn more? --> The PPT slides are available here in Cornell Box.
  • Do I need a Form 10? Not for these internal grants. If the grant PI would need approval to be a PI through an exception for an external grant application, then please get an email note from a department chair/center director or similar approving the PI to apply for this internal grant. Include this permission to be a PI with the single PDF application upload in Qualtrics when you apply. This exception note does not count towards the page limit.
  • If you are applying for a ZJU joint seed fund grant, please make sure to read the Cornell-issued RFP (linked above), which differs slightly from the China-issued version. Each side is funding its own researchers with slightly different guidelines in terms of what can be funded by each university.
  • What fringe and overhead rate should we use for this funding? --> For the China Innovation Grants, use 0% fringe benefit rate for contract college postdocs/staff due to the donation source. Endowed positions require standard fringe rates. The other grants do not allow staff salary, just GRA summer stipends and hourly student work. There is no IDC on any of the Spring 2020 Cornell China Center grants.
  • Do you have page formatting requirements? --> No, but size 10-12 font and 0.5-1" margins are typical. Either single or double spacing is fine; we expect that proposals will likely be single-spaced to include all requested information within the page guidelines.
  • Do these grants allow computer purchases? --> No.
  • Can I exceed the page limit to include extra text, a reference list, or images? --> We ask all grant applicants to stick to the page limit to be fair to all. Thanks!
  • How do we submit our CVs? -- To submit your application on the Cornell side, please compile everything into one PDF file and upload through the Qualtrics form.