ISH Opportunities 2026-2027

The UCLA Bedari Kindness Institute (BKI) is pleased to announce its call for research proposals for the 2026-2027 year. As home to the UCLA Initiative to Study Hate, we seek proposals that study both kindness and kindness-adjacent topics and hate and hate-related themes. BKI welcomes a diverse array of methodological and disciplinary approaches, as well as collaborative projects with researchers across campus. The Research Innovation Fund will support projects that range in scale from $5,000 (intended as seed funding) to $25,000 during the 2026-27 academic year.

This funding cycle takes place in incredibly fraught times, with hate, polarization, and inequity on the rise. Research and interventions that address these troubling trends and aim to inculcate compassion, prosociality, kindness, and constructive dialogue are more critical than ever. With that in mind, we are particularly interested in projects that:

1. Have the potential for demonstrable outcomes within one year;
2. Examine or pilot interventions aimed at increasing kindness or constructive dialogue across differences or mitigating hate;
3. Measure the efficacy of kindness- and hate- related interventions;
4. Involve partnerships with community organizations that implement/design such interventions;
5. Propose kindness-related research that has direct application to the LA Olympics of 2028.

Expectations of Grantees

Receiving a research grant from BKI means becoming an active, dedicated member of our research community. The project PI (or at least one member from the project team) must be available to attend the monthly, in-person ISH seminar to encourage ongoing and productive cross-fertilization across disciplines and methods. Applicants who cannot commit to participating in the in-person seminar on a regular basis should not apply. In addition, we expect BKI researcher team members to participate in the following activities:

1. Quarterly BKI-sponsored events on campus;
2. Opportunities to engage in outreach work with extramural partners that include nonprofit and governmental organizations committed to fighting hate (e.g., presenting or providing research progress, participating on panels, etc., on behalf of BKI);
3. Submit both a midyear report and end-of-year report.

Guidelines

• Projects can include individual PIs or teams of researchers.
• Graduate and undergraduate students are welcome to apply with a faculty PI.
• Research teams can include researchers/team members based at institutions and organizations outside of UCLA, but the PI must be a UCLA faculty or staff member.
• Applicants should be able to articulate the real-world significance of their projects (even if your project is not applied/focused explicitly on an intervention, how might practitioners, community organizations, or policy makers apply your research to interventions?) To that end, you should identify in your proposal at least 3 community partners with whom you plan to share your findings upon completion (i.e., who is the intended audience of your research?).
• Funding can be used to support research that will result in a creative project.
• Funding cannot be used for faculty salary support. Support for students and postdoctoral scholars is encouraged.
• Funding can be used to support research travel.
• Funding must be spent in accordance with university policies.
• Unless otherwise negotiated, funding will be dispersed in September 2026 and should be spent by September 2027.

To Apply:

Applications should include the following:

(1) Project Title

(2) Project Abstract (up to 200 words)

(3) Project Budget

(4) CVs of participants

(5) Name/Contact information of the department’s finance officer (who will be responsible

for receiving and managing the transfer, as well as submitting a close-out report)

Please note that all funds need to be spent in compliance with University policies and procedures. The applicant’s home department must endorse the Principal Investigator and will be responsible for managing funds.

The deadline for proposals is June 22, 2026.

For questions about proposals, please contact David N. Myers at myers@history.ucla.edu or Amalia Mora at amora@college.ucla.edu.

Applications should be submitted online using this form: https://forms.gle/H55uyU8vn1nLa8wq7