Deadline: April 30, 2025
Award: $4,000
The Program in Arms Control, Disarmament, and International Security (ACDIS) at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign invites proposals for the Summer 2025 Undergraduate Award. This award provides a $4,000 research stipend in support of undergraduate student research on topics broadly related to national and international security, conducted between May 16 and August 15, 2025.
ACDIS is committed to advancing interdisciplinary research that addresses security challenges in all their complexity. The program brings together perspectives from engineering, the natural sciences, the social sciences, and the humanities to produce integrated analyses that go beyond narrow or simplistic explanations.
As part of the program, the selected recipient will also deliver a one-hour seminar on their summer research during the Fall 2025 ACDIS Seminar Series and submit a contribution to the Illini Journal of International Security (IJOIS).
Application Process
Deadline: April 30, 2025
To apply, please submit the following materials as a single PDF to acdis@illinois.edu with the subject line: Summer 2025 Award - undergraduate:
A cover letter identifying your department, degree program, and providing a summary of your proposed research and an outline of the IJOIS contribution.
A current Curriculum Vitae.
One letter of recommendation from a faculty mentor (submitted separately to acdis@illinois.edu with the candidate's name in the subject line). Only one letter is required.
Eligibility
Applicants must be undergraduate students at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.
Evaluation Criteria
The ACDIS Undergraduate Fellowship is intended to support impactful research that contributes meaningfully to the field of national and international security studies and serves as a foundation for future scholarly or collaborative work. Therefore, preference will be given to proposals that:
Demonstrate a clear path toward a scholarly product, such as a peer-reviewed publication, submission to an external funding opportunity, or the development of a collaborative research project.
Address issues of interest to multiple audiences, including academic researchers, federal agencies, national laboratories, and policy communities.
Include a letter of recommendation from a faculty mentor who is engaged in the research proposed by the applicant and is an ACDIS affiliate or core faculty member. Information on becoming an ACDIS affiliate is available at this link: https://acdis.illinois.edu/research-overview/faculty .
Align closely with ACDIS research themes, including but not limited to Arms Control and Nuclear Nonproliferation, Energy Security, Biosecurity, Environment & Security, Ethics, Morality & Culture of War, Ethnic Conflict, Evolution of Global Security Regime, Food & Water Security, Information & Data Security, Nuclear Security, Physical Security, Regional Security & Peacekeeping, Terrorism & Counterterrorism.
Please direct all questions to acdis@illinois.edu