Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship (MMUF)

The program is open to all students who meet the program’s eligibility requirements and does not use preferences or criteria based on any trait protected under applicable law.  

Eligible to apply are Harvard College sophomores, who:

• Are in good standing with the College
• Are concentrating in the humanities and humanistic social sciences.
• Are committed to conducting an independent research project within their concentrations with guidance from Harvard faculty
• Have serious interest in pursuing graduate study, particularly the PhD in a humanities or humanistic social sciences fields
• Demonstrate a commitment to the program’s goals
• Are U.S. Citizens, U.S. permanent residents or DACA/undocumented students. 

The fellowship is not intended for students who wish to pursue law school, medical school or other professional education.

Fellows receive:

• Mentoring towards research goals and graduate school preparation
• Guidance on mentors and mentoring relationships, building research skills, applying to graduate school and more
• Access to a cohort of scholars doing research in humanities and humanistic social sciences
• Opportunities to network and present research at the regional MMUF conferences
• Fellowship support:
  • Term-time stipend (for two academic years)
  • Summer stipend (for two summers – summer before junior year, summer before senior year)
  • Additional financial support for graduate school (PhD) application preparation and other scholarly development, as needed and requested

All funding awards are contingent upon satisfactory program participation and serious commitment to doing scholarly research while a fellow and remaining in good standing within the College.

In the spring of their sophomore year, applicants will be evaluated on the following criteria:

• Academic achievement and scholarly promise
• Commitment to independent research and scholarly work in humanities and related fields as an undergraduate and in the future
• Well-articulated research proposal/plan
• Commitment to the goals of MMUF
• Interest in pursuing graduate study, particularly the PhD in humanities/humanistic social sciences and a professorial (research and teaching) career
• Strong letters of recommendation that validate the candidate's capabilities, scholarly promise, and potential contributions and growth through participation in MMUF

Students who accept the opportunity must remain in good standing with the College for the duration of their time in the program until graduation.

The selection process involves application review by faculty committee and interviews of semi-finalists. Applicants who are selected for interview will be notified after spring break; typically, interviews will be scheduled shortly thereafter. Applicants will be notified of their final status in late March. 

Applicants should carefully read the full application instructions, manage their time and preparation accordingly, and adhere strictly to the formatting instructions and deadline. 

All materials must be submitted to the Harvard University Funding Portal (HUFP) through this opportunity link: MMUF 2025-2026. Either use the direct application link below or navigate to the opportunity by selecting "Harvard College (students only)" and navigating to "Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship (MMUF) Program-2025-2026.”

Prepare the following components in PDF format and upload to HUFP:

• Unofficial transcript. Download your transcript from my.harvard. The file should not be password protected.
• Two-page resume
  • Indicate significant activities, achievements, and experiences in college that demonstrate your interests and potential achievements.
• Two academic letters of recommendation
  • At least one of these should be from a professor who has taught you/mentored you in an academic context at Harvard.
  • The second letter may be from another member of the Harvard academic/research community. Alternatively, students who have pursued research or other academic-related activities outside of Harvard may choose to have mentors from those experiences write the second letter.
  • Letter writers may be members of the full-time faculty, a graduate teaching fellow, a postdoc, librarian, scholars who are Radcliffe fellows, visiting researchers, or members of Harvard’s society of fellows.
  • Letters should describe  a) how the letter writer knows you,  b) your fit for the program and how the program will help you grow, c) your ability to pursue research independently, d) your determination, initiative, motivation toward understanding a topic, building an argument, and follow through, etc. (your research potential!) and e) how you would contribute to and benefit from being in the program and MMUF scholarly community.
• Essays
  • Font size should be 11pt.
  • The essays should be single spaced and labelled by the essay heading.
  • Each page of the essay document should be labelled with Applicant’s Last Name and First Name.
  • All essays should be generated as a single document and saved in PDF format.

MMUF aims to elevate a broad range of scholarly perspectives in the U.S. academy and to support scholars whose perspectives enrich research and teaching in their fields. The essays are as follows: 

1. Academic Interests: Briefly, describe your academic/intellectual interests. Discuss 2–3 concrete and significant experiences (e.g., courses, jobs, community service, research projects, other) that have shaped your current intellectual interests. For each experience, describe your role, the actions you took, the skills, knowledge and insights you may have developed, and the impact on your interests.  [500 words, max.]
2. Research Project: Discuss the research project you plan to undertake as a fellow, including your specific topic, research questions; the methodologies, approaches and theoretical frameworks you would use; examples of the resources/sources you would use; challenges/obstacles you may foresee in pursuing the work. Briefly, explain your academic preparation for this research and your plans for building additional skills and knowledge related to this research pursuit. Finally, discuss three (3) Harvard faculty who might serve as your faculty mentor and why any one of them (or all of them) may be a good mentor fit(s) for you and/or your ultimate research project. At the end of this essay, students should cite their sources if sources have been referenced in the description of research project. The citations should take up no more than one page. Works cited are not included in word count.  [750 words, max.]
3. Your Contribution to program goals: How will your scholarly interests and research advance the MMUF program’s mission to broaden scholarly perspectives in the U.S. academy and expand the knowledge taught and produced in the humanities and related fields? [500 words, max.]
4. Goals:  What are your career goals? Why are you particularly motivated to pursue graduate study (particularly a PhD) in your field of interest and/or related fields and why are you interested in a career in research and teaching? What steps have you already taken towards these goals and what do you hope to learn from this program that relates to these goals? [300 words, max.]