Finding Funding as a Graduate Student

Check out our new interactive Build your Funding Train website.

To find suitable funding agencies, start by asking your faculty mentor(s), laboratory colleagues and recent alumni about their experiences. Federal agencies, such as NIH and NSF, sponsor fellowships and career development awards. The NIH fellowships are focused on providing training for biomedical, behavioral, and clinical researchers. Other federal agencies, and nonfederal agencies, such as societies, foundations, and associations, also solicit fellowship applications.  Additionally, many institutions offer internally supported fellowships as well as institutional research training grants like NIH’s T32 awards.

At Stanford University, Chelsey R. Perry compiles lists of funding opportunities for graduate students, postdocs, and faculty. Email Chelsey (chelseyp@stanford.edu, request SMART email list) to subscribe to her emails. You can also view her comprehensive lists of funding opportunities:

• SBSA’s list of Funding and Training Opportunities (graduate students): https://med.stanford.edu/sbsa/resources/funding-and-training.html
• Funding opportunities to promote diversity (graduate students, postdocs, etc): https://med.stanford.edu/rmg/funding/diversity.html
• Fellowship opportunities (graduate students, postdocs, clinical fellows, etc.): https://med.stanford.edu/rmg/funding/fellowships.html
• Grant opportunities (postdocs, clinical fellows, instructors, etc.): https://med.stanford.edu/rmg/funding/grants.html
• Stanford University Seed Funding: https://seedfunding.stanford.edu/
• Searchable databases (see Pivot or Foundation Directory): https://med.stanford.edu/rmg/funding/searchable-funding-databases.html (Tips for searching: https://doresearch.stanford.edu/funding/tips-searching-funding-opportunities)