November 1, 2009
The National Collegiate Honors Council is pleased to announce the establishment of a major fellowship program, The John and Edythe Portz Interdisciplinary Research Fellowship. This new fellowship, funded by the Portz estate bequest to the NCHC, will support creative and innovative endeavors that cross boundaries. It invites application from individuals who wish to undertake cross disciplinary research or from a team of two students from different disciplines who propose a single collaborative project. The project will be funded for a period of up to 15 months with the expectation that upon its completion, the Fellowship recipient will make a formal presentation of the research at the NCHC annual conference. Fellowship support is in an amount between $5,000 and $7,000. NCHC expects to award up to 2 Portz fellowships per year.
Honors students in good standing from 2-year colleges or 4-year colleges and universities with current Institutional membership in NCHC may apply at any point in their undergraduate studies. However, given the scope of the research expectation, applicants who are in their final senior term will not be considered. In addition to two letters of recommendation from faculty members, an endorsement from the institutional representative named in the NCHC membership is required.
Only ONE PROPOSAL a year from each member institution is permitted.
Instructions to applicants and application materials appear on the NCHC website. Applications should be 15-20 pages in length, including a full and well-supported project statement, research timeline, and personal impact statement, among other items. All required application materials are described extensively on the application itself. Completed applications should demonstrate clearly the applicant’s academic preparation to undertake this work in the time allotted and that the scope of the project is manageable during that period.
Applications and supporting materials must be submitted electronically by February 1 with notification of results by April 1. Portz Fellows may begin their projects immediately but are expected to complete them no later than August 31 of the following year. Fellows will also submit two progress reports, the first on November 1 of the granting year and the second on April 1 of the following year.
The fellowship is named for John and Edythe Portz and supported by their bequest to the National Collegiate Honors Council. John Portz was one of the founders of the NCHC, he served as its President, Executive Secretary Treasurer, and Editor of its Newsletter. He was an outstanding faculty member at the University of Maryland College Park and the institution’s first Honors Program Director. Particularly original in conceiving innovative curricula, he was profoundly devoted to students, and a gifted shaper of community interaction. In partnership with his wife Edythe, he left a generous estate to be divided between his University and the NCHC to be used as financial support for student enterprises. The nationally competitive research grant we are announcing, the Portz Fellowship, joins many awards and scholarships that bear the Portz name at his University, in grants for honors students throughout his state, and the Portz Scholarship that the NCHC currently awards.