Fellowships and Grants Special Collections Research Center

The Special Collections Research Center (SCRC) annually accepts proposals for Faculty Fellows who want to provide students with an experiential learning opportunity to handle, analyze and interpret SCRC’s primary source materials as a core component in their classes. The program supports innovative curriculum development and fosters new ideas about how to transform the role of special collections in university instruction. Each fellow will receive a stipend, as well as an introduction to SCRC's collections, primary source analysis and historical contextualization skills, and designing conversations, activities and assignments utilizing archival/special collections materials.

SCRC’s primary sources span over 4,000 years—from the 21st century BCE to the 21st century CE—and represent an array of topics and perspectives relevant to the study of human culture and knowledge. They include various formats, including written and printed material, art, architecture and design, and music and recorded sound. Engaging with SCRC’s rare and archival collections allows students, faculty and researchers to explore and question historical evidence and testimonies while connecting with the innovative and enduring ways people have communicated, documented their experiences and recorded personal memories throughout history.

George Bain G'06, a member of the Library Associates, and William F. Gaske ’72, a member of the Libraries Advisory Board, provided generous gift funding towards the SCRC Faculty Fellows Program. The original funding for the program was made possible through the generosity of the Gladys Krieble Delmas Foundation, which promotes the advancement and perpetuation of humanistic inquiry and artistic creativity by encouraging excellence in scholarship and in the performing arts and by supporting research libraries and other institutions that transmit our cultural heritage. For more information about how to financially support a faculty fellow for the upcoming academic year and beyond, contact Dean David Seaman at 315.443.5533 or via email at dseaman@syr.edu.

Eligibility

• Open to all Syracuse University tenure-track and full-time non-tenure track faculty.
• Proposals may be from any discipline taught on campus but must be for a course to be taught in the following academic year.
• Team-taught courses are not eligible.
• Course enrollment must be capped at 20 students.
• The course must be offered during SCRC’s regular operating hours.

The call for applications for the upcoming academic year are posted in the spring. For questions or additional information, contact Jana Rosinski, SCRC Instruction and Education Librarian, at jrosinsk@syr.edu.

Faculty Fellows Recipients:

2026-2027: Svetoslava Todorova [CEE 471/671: Environmental Chemistry and Analysis and HNR 360: The Role of Science in Environmental Governance]

2025-2026: Arun Brahmbhatt [REL 300: The Art of Devotion in South Asia] and Zeke Leonard [DES 561: Sustainable Furniture and Lighting]

2024-2025: Stephanie Shirilan [ETS 421: Shakespeare's Natural Worlds] and Lawrence Chua [ARC 500/QSX 400: Queering the Map]

2023-2024: LaVerne Gray [IST 400: Black Information, Memory, and Justice] and Julia White [SPE 644: Significant Disabilities, Shifts in Paradigms and Practices]

2022-2023: Doug DuBois [APH 340/TRM 600: How We Look—Photography, Identity and the Archive]

2021-2022: Joan Bryant [AAS 400/HNR 360: American Freedom Before & After Emancipation] and Kathryn Everly [SPA 400: Culture and Conflict in 20th Century Spain]

2019-2020: Jim Watts [REL 301: Ancient Near Eastern Religions & Cultures] and Kate Hanzalik [WRT 205: Critical Research & Writing in the Arts]

2018-2019: Stephano Selenu [LIT 245/ITA 300: Florence and Renaissance Civilization] and Shannon Novak [ANT 400/600: Excavating Bodies in the Archives]

2016-2017: Brice Nordquist [WRT 303: Research & Writing—Scenes of an (Im)mobile City] and Emily Stokes-Rees [MUS 506: Introduction to Curatorship]

Since 1949 Syracuse University has assembled historical documents, including manuscript, print, visual, and media materials, related to adult education. This material is known collectively as the Alexander N. Charters Library for Educators of Adults, in recognition of Dr. Charters' efforts in promoting and expanding our adult education holdings. Through the generosity of Dr. Charters, we are also able to offer annual grants to one or more scholars or practitioners wishing to do research in our adult education collections.

About Dr. Charters

Alexander N. Charters (1916-2018) earned his Ph.D. in adult education from the University of Chicago in 1948. He served as assistant dean of adult education and then dean and vice-president for continuing education at Syracuse University. With his wife, Dr. Margaret Charters, he was active in all aspects of adult education, from teaching and administration to organization, lecturing, consulting, and research.

The Charters Library Collection

Syracuse University Libraries hold one of the largest and most comprehensive collections on the field of adult and continuing education. The materials come from all over the world and document the international history and development of the field, which includes literacy, human resource development, distance education, international development, andragogy, and more.

The Charters Library is free and open to the public; adult education practitioners and educators are especially encouraged to utilize the collections. Materials include:

• More than 100 archival collections, containing correspondence, organizational records, publications, conference material, memorabilia, photographs, audio and video recordings, and more
• Records of the University Continuing Education Association and the Clearinghouse of Resources for Adult Educators
• 160 periodical titles, including many complete runs
• 220 newsletter titles
• 78 boxes of pamphlets
• More than 500 titles from Syracuse University Publications in Continuing Education
• More than 500 sound recordings
• More than 100 video recordings

For more information on the collections and their history, see the Charters Library website.

Applying for the Grant

SCRC offers annual grants of up to $5,000 to scholars or practitioners wishing to do research using SCRC’s adult education collections, with the amount of the award dependent on the scope of the research outlined in the applicant’s proposal.

Applications are currently closed.

The application cycle for 2026 – 2027 will open soon, and we encourage interested applicants to monitor this page and explore the Charters Library adult education collections. Please contact Max Wagh, SCRC Administrative Coordinator, with any questions mlwagh@syr.edu.

Grant Awardee Expectations

• Conduct onsite research using available adult education collections in the SCRC Reading Room, according to SCRC visitor policies and procedures.
• Present on the progress of your research to the Syracuse University Libraries community.
• Submit a post-visit report to SCRC within two weeks of research visit.

Recipients have the opportunity to submit copies of any scholarly output resulting from their work for inclusion in SURFACE, Syracuse University’s institutional repository.

Payments may be subject to taxation. Recipients of the award should reference https://bfas.syr.edu/comptroller/resources/payments-to-or-from-syracuse-university/payments-to-individuals for more information.