Greetings,

We are excited to share this new funding opportunity from the Russell Sage Foundation. Margaret Olivia Sage (MOS) Grants will support research by multi- or inter-disciplinary teams on social, economic, and political challenges with generational consequences for social and living conditions in the United States. More information about the award can be found in the synopsis and links below. For a full list of currently open opportunities that have been announced through our office, please visit our Current Opportunities web page. As a reminder, our Research Development team is available to provide proposal development support to FAS ladder faculty.

Russell Sage Foundation (RSF): Margaret Olivia Sage (MOS) Grants

OSP Deadline: OSP review not required at LOI stage
Departments or areas may require additional time for proposal review and submission. Please discuss a timeline with your grants administrator.
Sponsor Deadline for Letters of Inquiry (LOI): December 1, 2026 at 2:00 PM ET
Award Amount: Up to $750,000 for direct costs over three years, plus 15% indirect costs. RSF may consider particularly promising and successful projects for a renewal grant of up to $500,000 over two additional years.
- MOS Grant funds may be used for salary support, research assistance, data collection expenses, dissemination, and other related research expenses.
- Budget information is not required in the LOI. Guidance and a budget template will be provided to PIs who are invited to submit full proposals.

Program Overview

The Russell Sage Foundation (RSF) is launching a new competition, for Margaret Olivia Sage (MOS) Grants, to support research by multi- or inter-disciplinary teams on social, economic, and political challenges with generational consequences for social and living conditions in the United States. Such challenges are typically national in scope, involve both systemic and individual factors, and the questions they raise are as urgent for policymakers and communities as they are for researchers. MOS grant projects should have the potential to catalyze new fields of inquiry and policy innovation. Projects must include plans for disseminating research to the public and should inform the work of community organizations or policymakers. RSF is particularly interested in projects that offer concrete strategies for community engagement, either through partnership or dissemination.

Priority Areas

Exemplifying the scope and ambition of MOS projects, the Foundation has identified four current priority areas for support:

democracy,
the societal impacts of artificial intelligence,
inequality and affordability, and
data infrastructure for social science research.

The priority areas highlight major challenges to American society that are aligned with RSF's core research priorities.

Eligibility Criteria

All PIs and Co-PIs must have a doctorate.
Teams must be multi- or inter-disciplinary.
Collaborations across research institutions and/or with community partners are encouraged. A research team that partners with a community organization will be considered as multidisciplinary for eligibility purposes and the community partner can be a Co-PI on the application.

LOI Materials

Maximum of 3 single-spaced pages (with standard 12-point font and 1-inch margins), excluding references. LOIs must include:

The research question(s) grounded in extant literature across disciplines.
The research design and timeline for the research.
The project’s potential to catalyze new fields of inquiry and inform policy innovation.
The multi- or inter-disciplinary research team and why the proposed combination of investigators and disciplines are necessary for the project; community participation could be described here.

CV for PI and co-PIs: 5 pages maximum per CV.

Additional Information and Resources

Read the complete application guidelines for MOS Grants and RSF Blog post about this new program. Applicants are also encouraged to review RSF's Best Practices for Grant Writing recorded webinar from September 2026, Tips for Drafting an LOI, and Grants Database.

LOIs and full proposals are submitted through RSF's Fluxx application portal. The Foundation also offers a Fluxx Instructional Video with guidance for using the application system.

MOS Grant applications follow a two-step application process that begins with a letter of inquiry (LOI). LOIs will be reviewed internally by RSF staff for fit with priorities and application criteria. LOIs that meet the MOS grant criteria and have the potential for greatest impact will be advanced for review by the selection committee, and selected applicants will be invited to submit full proposals, due February 22, 2027. Full proposals will undergo external peer review, followed by committee and president/board review. The full review process takes about 6.5 months from an LOI deadline to a final decision (expected for this cycle in June 2027), with funding starting September 1, 2027. This will be an annual competition. RSF will consider making 1-2 grants per cycle.

Questions from FAS faculty about this opportunity may be directed to FAS Research Development.

RESOURCES

Research Development maintains a Sample Proposal Library of successful proposals from recent award recipients that are available to FAS and SEAS faculty by request; please email Research Development to request to view a proposal. For more information on Research Development's resources—including lists of internal funding programs, early career funding programs, and sabbatical fellowships—please visit the Funding Opportunities web page. Previous editions of FAS Funding Focus (FFF), a resource series tailored to help FAS faculty and staff navigate the ever-evolving landscape of grants and funding, are accessible in the FFF archive.

SEARCH FOR OPPORTUNITIES WITH PIVOT

All Harvard affiliates can search for opportunities and set up alerts using Pivot, a searchable database of federal and private funding opportunities. Information on Pivot, including a one-page user guide, and other funding opportunity databases available to the Harvard community can be found on the Funding Databases web page.

PIVOT CURATED SEARCHES

Curated funding opportunity lists are funding search topics of broad interest. The following curated lists can be further refined in Pivot based on your funding needs. To view the results you must be on a Harvard network or logged in to your Pivot account. Information on setting up a Pivot account can be found in our one-page Pivot user guide.

Social Sciences

Additional curated lists are available on the Funding Databases web page. We continue to add to and refine these lists based on feedback. Please feel free to reach out to us at research_development@fas.harvard.edu with any suggestions you may have.