Visiting Fellows Program

The COPAA Visiting Fellows Program is a short-term partnership opportunity involving a professional, practicing, or applied anthropologist (the Visiting Fellow, or VF) and a COPAA Member Anthropology Department. The program is designed to be mutually beneficial to both parties. The VF and Department develop a proposal to engage in a collaborative learning experience, share specific knowledge and skills (e.g., via seminars, courses, classroom discussions), and/or work on a project together. The program supports COPAA’s mission to advance the education and training of students, faculty, and professional and practicing anthropologists in applied anthropology.

Partnerships receive two forms of support: (1) $2,500 to support expenses for a campus partner to host a Visiting Fellow and (2) $1,000 to travel to the SfAA Annual Meeting where COPAA holds its annual business meeting ($500 to the lead faculty applicant and $500 to the Visiting Fellow).

Please send completed application by December 1, 2024 to copaainfo@gmail.com.

Award Details

Eligibility
- Professional, practicing, or applied anthropologist
- Faculty from COPAA-member anthropology department
- Departments must be current in payment of dues and may only submit one application per award cycle
- Recipients from the prior year are not eligible
Award Scope and Disbursement ($2,500)
- One award made biennially, in odd-numbered years.
- Funds may be used to off-set costs for a campus visit or visits (meal, lodging, travel) and honorarium for the Visiting Fellow.
- COPAA-member anthropology department must submit a budget and budget justification. If the department will provide matching funds, please specify in the budget proposal (this is not a requirement to be considered for the award).
- Half of the award will be dispersed at the start of the award period; remainder to be dispersed upon submission of Collaborative Report
- Funds released by COPAA Treasurer: Jason Miller, jason.miller2@washburn.edu
Application Submission
- Due Date: December 1 (even-numbered years)
- Send to COPAA gmail account: copaainfo@gmail.com
- Applications will be evaluated based on scope of work and anticipated benefits for the practitioner and COPAA member department.
Notification of Award: December 15 (even-numbered years)
Submission of Collaborative Report
- Due Date: Within 1 month of the end of the year of award
- Send to COPAA gmail account: copaainfo@gmail.com
- Guidelines for Collaborative Report below and on COPAA website
- To be published in SfAA Newsletter

COPAA Visiting Fellow Presentation Grant ($500 x 2)
- To support the presentation of collaborative work at a COPAA-sponsored session and the COPAA Business Meeting at the SfAA meeting immediately following the completion of the VF award
- $500 awarded to Faculty Contact to offset travel costs to SfAA
- $500 awarded to the VF to offset travel costs to SfAA
- Released by COPAA Treasurer following SfAA meetings and presentation

Examples of Potential Collaboration:

Mentoring students for careers in practice
Working with faculty to establish practical training materials
Guest lectures in a methods or applied anthropology class
Hosting workshops in specialized topics in practice
Keynote speaker at forum or conference
Consulting on community engaged research
Professional training and skill development (contract negotiation, designing scope of work, networking beyond the academy)

Guidelines for Collaborative Report:

At the end of the project, departments and Visiting Fellows should submit a collaborative written report to COPAA. This report should be written for publication in the SfAA newsletter. It should include:

Description of the collaboration
Accomplishments
Benefits to the students, faculty, department, and Visiting Fellow
What worked well and why
What did not work well and why
Suggestions for departments considering the program in the future
Photographs of the project

Visiting Fellows Program

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Previous Visiting Fellow Reports

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