Because much internal funding is not available to students, it is wise to team up with a faculty advisor or collaborator in order to qualify for some of these grants.

The Graduate College offers information on internal funding opportunities for graduate and professional students. The Graduate Student Senate and  Graduate & Professional Student Government offer travel funds for research and attending professional conferences/meetings.

Internal Funding Grants : The IFI programs support work that enhances the competitiveness of applications for external funding, assists in developing new initiatives, and/or supports new directions in scholarly/creative activity. Includes

• Arts & Humanities Initiative (AHI) Standard Grant
• Major Project Grant
• Major Conferences/ Ideation Meetings
• Core Facilities/Shared Equipment for Research
• Strategic Global Initiatives Award (sgIA)

Interdisciplinary Research Grants : Interdisciplinary Research Grants allow University of Iowa scholars to collaborate across disciplines on projects relevant to current research that steps beyond traditional modes of scholarly inquiry.

The UI Grant Bulletin is a great place to find additional funding opportunities for UI staff and students.

The Division of Sponsored Programs can provide instruction on how to search for external funding.

National Endowment for the Humanities Office of Digital Humanities

• Start Up Grants : The Digital Humanities Start-Up Grants program awards relatively small grants to support the planning stages of innovative projects that promise to benefit the humanities. Proposals should be for the planning or initial stages of digital initiatives in any area of the humanities. Digital Humanities Start-Up Grants should result in plans, prototypes, or proofs of concept for long-term digital humanities projects prior to implementation.
• Implementation Grants : This program is designed to fund the implementation of innovative digital-humanities projects that have successfully completed a start-up phase and demonstrated their value to the field.
• Institutes in Advanced Topics in the Digital Humanities Grants : these NEH grants support national or regional (multistate) training programs for scholars and advanced graduate students to broaden and extend their knowledge of digital humanities. Through these programs, NEH seeks to increase the number of humanities scholars using digital technology in their research and to broadly disseminate knowledge about advanced technology tools and methodologies relevant to the humanities.

Alfred P Sloan Foundation

• Digital Information Technology : to better our understanding of the relationship between technology, information, and society, primarily through research on and the development of digital information technology for the conduct of scholarly research and public engagement with knowledge. Grant making in this program focuses on three distinct sub-areas of Data and Computational Research, Scholarly Communication, and Universal Access to Knowledge.

Andrew W. Mellon Foundation

• Scholarly Communications : The Scholarly Communications program assists research libraries, archives, museums, universities, presses, and arts organizations that seek to realize this potential.. by supporting the creation, dissemination, use, and preservation of original sources, interpretive scholarship in the humanities, and other scholarly and artistic materials.
• Diversity : The Diversity program seeks to help diversify the next generation of college and university faculty through the Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship (MMUF) and other pipeline programs; it also aims to strengthen institutions that improve educational attainment of historically underrepresented groups.  More generally, the Diversity grant making area supports projects or research focused on the relationship between diversity and learning.
• Higher Education and Scholarship in the Humanities : Through the program in Higher Education and Scholarship in the Humanities, the Foundation assists select colleges, universities, and research institutes in the work of training scholars and producing scholarship in the humanities broadly conceived, and thereby contributing to culture and society.  In practical terms, this means helping institutions and professional organizations respond to the economic, demographic, financial, and technological challenges affecting higher education, supporting initiatives designed to enhance the learning experience of both undergraduate and graduate students in the humanities, and fostering collaborations within and among institutions that support disciplinary innovation, foster practices of diversity and inclusion, and promote the social value of the humanities.

For a more comprehensive list, take a look at the UI Office of Research and EconomicDevelopment page on External Funding

Grinnell College and University of Iowa Mellon Grant "Digital Bridges for Humanistic Inquiry"