Call for Proposals: URSSI Early-Career Fellows

Kyle Niemeyer and Nic Weber

May 12, 2026

The US Research Software Sustainability Institute (URSSI) invites applications for an Early-Career Fellowship program.

This fellowship offers $25,000 of funding support for research in one of the following areas: AI/ML Integration in Scientific Software Development, Scientific Software Sustainability, or Software Education Research.

The fellowship is open to PhD students, postdoctoral researchers, research software engineers, and research scientists who are less than three years removed from their final degree or appointment.

Applications are due by June 1, 2026 at 11:59 PM PST.

Please see below for additional details on eligibility and how to apply.

Eligibility

We welcome applications from US-based early-career researchers including: PhD Students; Postdoctoral Researchers (<3 years from PhD); Research Software Engineers (0-3 years experience after terminal degree); and Research Scientists (0-3 years experience after terminal degree).

URSSI is committed to fostering a diverse and inclusive scientific software community. We strongly encourage applications from individuals of all backgrounds and institutions.

Fellowship Benefits

We can offer financial support of $25,000 for all projects. Fellows will also have access to URSSI’s extensive network and resources including mentorship from senior researchers, professional development opportunities, and the opportunity to collaborate with a cohort of peer fellows.

Selected fellows will be expected to:

  • Submit monthly progress reports via GitHub
  • Attend bi-weekly cohort meetings
  • Contribute to an URSSI newsletter
  • Participate in URSSI events (remote)
  • Mentor future fellows

We expect this cohort of URSSI Fellows will start June 15, 2026 and end in November 2026, with a progress evaluation on July 25th.

Research Tracks

For the Summer 2026 cohort of fellows we are specifically looking for projects in one of the three following areas:

  1. AI/ML & Scientific Software: We are interested in supporting research or evidence-based best practices for integrating AI/ML tools in scientific software development. We welcome projects that investigate basic research questions (e.g., reliability in agentic coding) as well as applied projects that may have the goal of informing policy or practices within a specific research domain. We are particularly interested in the integration of AI for validation, reliability, and reproducibility checks.

    Projects previously supported by this track include:

  2. Scientific Software Sustainability: We would like to support researchers developing scientific software (biology, earth sciences, social sciences, physics, etc.) to extend or improve practices within that domain. Example projects could include: Developing domain-specific software sustainability audits (e.g., identifying critical dependencies); creating assessment tools for research software reliability; or implementing methods for automated documentation generation (e.g., LLM assisted).

Projects previously supported by this track include:

  1. Software Education Research: URSSI runs a semi-annual school (2–3 days of co-located classroom work) to train researchers to use best practices in research software development. We are particularly interested in expanding our curriculum to include best practices working with a coding harness and agentic software development. This might include developing new modules or lessons for URSSI, or producing more general web content (e.g. blog posts and videos) on these topics.

We will not fund the following:

  • Feature Development: this includes projects that are focused solely on adding new features or maintaining existing scientific software (aside from software specifically in support of research aligned with the above tracks).
  • Surveys: this includes projects that focus on literature reviews or performing community surveys that are unlikely to generalize to a broad URSSI audience.

Application

To submit an application, please provide the following information, your CV, and a brief project proposal (no more than three pages) at the following link: urssi.us/summer-2026-fellowship-application

  1. Personal Information
  • Current role and institution
  • Research domain/area of work
  • ORCID (optional)
  • GitHub/GitLab profile (optional)
  • CV (upload as PDF)
  1. Project Proposal (upload as PDF), which should be no longer than three single-space pages using an 11-inch font, not including any references. Proposals much include the following:
  • Project Goals and Objectives: State the track that your project is most closely aligned with; Provide a brief overview of the project including related research, and previous efforts; and, Provide clear, measurable goals that will be accomplished within six months. Include specific objectives that contribute to the broader URSSI mission and research track.
  • Expected Impact on Scientific Software Community: Briefly describe the direct and indirect benefits of the research to the scientific software community.
  • Community Engagement Strategy: How will you involve or get feedback from the broader scientific software community? Include specific outreach and collaboration plans.
  • Evaluation Metrics: Concrete ways to measure project success. Include both quantitative and qualitative metrics.
  • Timeline and Deliverables: Plan Month-by-month breakdown of activities, methods, and approaches. Include specific milestones and check-in points. The deliverables description should specify what, at the successful conclusion of the project, you will ultimately produce.

  1. Budget proposal ($25,000 total) with justification for expenses. Your budget must include a $10,000 stipend for the fellow or fellows. The budget may not include hiring or paying students, support staff, or collaborators.

  2. Contact information for two professional references.

  3. If applicable, a letter from your supervisor indicating approval/support of the proposed effort.

Selection Criteria

Applications will be evaluated based on: Intellectual & Technical Merit (30%); Potential Impact (40%); and Feasibility (30%).

Incomplete applications will not be reviewed.

Important Dates

  • Application deadline: June 1, 2026 11:59 PM PST
  • Notification: June 15, 2026

FAQs

What can the budget be spent on? Generally we are open to whatever is required to successfully complete a fellowship project. Below are the guidelines we intend to follow in all but exceptional cases:

  • Time/salary - required $10k
  • Travel - suggested max $5k
  • Research expenses - suggested max $10k
  • Equipment - by request only

Does the fellowship funding come directly to the recipient or go through an institution (potentially with overhead)? The fellowship will come directly to the recipient as an independent contractor. (Note that there are tax implications for this, which you would be responsible for handling.)

What is the expected time commitment? We anticipate competitive projects will be completed in a six-month time period—the level of effort and the time commitment will vary between projects. If you intend to propose a project that will take longer than six months to complete please be in touch before your submission.

How many fellowships are available? We anticipate funding 4-6 fellows this round (Summer 2026).

If I am not selected can I submit to a future fellowship? Yes! But, please note that we have limited capacity to provide feedback on previous proposals.

Can I submit multiple applications? No, we will not consider more than one application per candidate per cycle.

Will you support collaborative applications? Yes, with a few stipulations:

  • Each project must have a designated lead (this person should submit the proposal). The project lead is ultimately responsible for the commitments of the proposal.
  • We will not support separate applications that are codependent (e.g., results or work of one proposal depends on potential funding for another proposal).

Do I have to live in the USA to be eligible for this fellowship? Yes.