ANN ARBOR—The University of Michigan has received $1.97 million from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation to create a postdoctoral program that will enable recent Ph.D graduates to prepare for careers in the humanities and social sciences. The University plans to use the Mellon program as the model for a permanent postdoctoral program in the humanities to be funded by U-M.

The Mellon grant will provide support for scholars who have recently completed their doctoral programs. The three-year fellowships will provide them with the time and financial support to prepare the major publication usually required to obtain a tenured faculty position. The program also will give the fellows a range of teaching experiences, including support for teaching courses that make use of U-M’s special collections. It will provide fellows with mentoring by senior faculty, and enable them to mentor graduate students who are completing their dissertations. The University will benefit from the presence and contributions of this community of outstanding young scholars.

“U-M already is home to the Michigan Society of Fellows, one of the most highly-respected fellows programs in the country. The Rackham Graduate School is committed to building the Society to offer sustainable postdoctoral programs that can catalyze innovative collaborations in the humanities at the University of Michigan,” said Janet A. Weiss, dean of Rackham.

“We will integrate the Mellon fellows and Society fellows to create a model for enabling young scholars to develop into outstanding teachers and researchers for the future,” said Donald Lopez, chair of the society. “We look forward to creating a program that can serve as a model for postdoctoral programs nationally.”

A distinguishing feature of the new Mellon fellowship program will be its integration in the Michigan Society of Fellows. The Mellon fellows will become full members of the Michigan Society of Fellows and form the core of a dedicated humanities group within the society. The Michigan Society of Fellows, established in 1970 and funded by U-M, is one of the most prestigious postdoctoral fellowship programs in the U.S. It awards four three-year fellowships a year, usually one each in the humanities, social sciences and natural sciences, and one at large.

The six-year Mellon grant will provide support for three fellows a year, beginning in fall 2008. The funding from Mellon will support the fellows for two years, and funding from the University will support the third year of the Mellon fellowship. As the program progresses, U-M will increase support until 2014, when it will take over funding for the three entering fellows.

The integration of the Mellon and Society fellowships eventually will expand the Michigan Society of Fellows from its current annual cohort of twelve fellows to 21 fellows (a total of seven per year, for three years).

The program will be supported by the Michigan Society of Fellows endowment, Rackham Graduate School, the College of Literature, Science, and the Arts, and the Office of the Provost.

The new Mellon grant is the successor to a previous Michigan-Mellon Postdoctoral Program that began in fall 2002 and supported a total of fifteen fellows in the humanities over five years.