Federal Grant Award Summary

The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill received a $10.1 million Project Grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) under the Promotion of the Humanities Challenge Grants program (CFDA 45.130), awarded June 1, 2026, with a completion date of May 31, 2029. The School of Civic Life and Leadership (SCILL) at UNC-CH will use these matching funds to establish endowed faculty chairs and recruit leading scholars in undervalued academic fields critical to American civic education. Specifically, the grant supports the creation of chairs in the American Political Tradition, Great Books and Leadership, and the Classical Tradition to address the declining civics literacy and civil discourse among high school and college students.

Through this initiative, SCILL will enhance its capacity to educate future civilian and military leaders while developing a robust supply of future civic educators. The funded chairs will enable the institution to attract distinguished scholars, diversify faculty perspectives, and strengthen institutional expertise in American and Western political traditions at a time when demand for qualified civics educators is expected to exceed supply as civic education programs expand nationwide. As a challenge grant, the award requires SCILL to certify non-federal matching gifts over the performance period, which will be matched one-to-one with the federal funds to establish a term endowment supporting long-term humanities work.