Higher Education
Program Aims
Higher education has been a focus of the Foundation’s grantmaking since the Foundation’s very first grant in 1936 to Yenching University in Beijing. Over half of all grant monies awarded since the Foundation’s establishment have been to higher education institutions.
The Higher Education program today makes only a small number of grants each year. These grants primarily support projects involving faculty and doctoral students in the humanities and qualitative social sciences. Such grants aim to:
- stimulate and support scholarship, especially projects that break new ground and that cross disciplinary and geographic boundaries
- ensure that high-quality research informs policymaking and public discussion
- prepare the next generation of diverse faculty and academic leaders
Recent Grants
Renewal of Ewha-Luce International Seminar for Woman Graduate Students in STEM
Ewha Institute for Leadership Development|Seoul, Korea, Republic of
Outreach Campaign to Prevent Sexual Harassment in Academia
National Academy of Sciences|Washington, District of Columbia, United States
Advancing Women Leaders through the HERS Women in STEM Leadership Community
Higher Education Resource Services (HERS)|Denver, Colorado, United States
The Woodrow Wilson Higher Education Policy Fellowship: Microgrants for 2017–18 Fellows
Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation|Princeton, New Jersey, United States
Global Communities of Practice
Emory University|Atlanta, Georgia, United States
Program Administrators
Buffington has long experience in higher education, having served most recently as president of the University of the Arts in Philadelphia and before that as associate provost at Harvard University.
