The IIE Scholar Rescue Fund (IIE-SRF) provides fellowships for professors, researchers, and public intellectuals who face threats to their lives and careers in their home countries. These year-long fellowships support temporary academic positions at institutions of higher learning anywhere in the world where IIE-SRF fellows can continue their work in safety. In most cases, IIE-SRF fellows are eligible to apply for a second and final year of fellowship support.

Benefits

• The IIE-Scholar Rescue Fund (SRF) saves the lives, voices, and ideas of threatened scholars around the world by providing fellowships and safe academic environments.
• SRF achieves this by providing academic fellowships to professors, researchers, and public intellectuals who face threats in their home countries.
• These yearlong fellowships support visiting appointments at partnering higher education institutions anywhere in the world that allows the scholars to continue their work in safety.
• In most cases, IIE-SRF fellows are eligible to apply for the second year of fellowship support.

Eligibility

• Professors, senior researchers, and public intellectuals from any country, academic field, or discipline may qualify. Applications are reviewed for academic qualifications, the quality/potential of the applicant’s work, and the severity of the threats that the applicant faces. Preference is given to scholars who:
  • Are facing or have recently fled from immediate, severe, and targeted threats to their lives and/or careers in their home countries or countries of residence;
  • Hold a Ph.D. or highest degree in their field and/or who have extensive teaching or research experience at a university, college, or other institution of higher learning;
  • Demonstrate superior academic accomplishment and promise;
  • Will benefit their home and/or host academic communities.
• Applications from women and members of ethnic, racial, cultural, or religious minority groups, or those otherwise underrepresented in their fields are encouraged.
• Please note that applicants who lack valid travel documents may still apply for the IIE-SRF fellowship, although IIE-SRF is unable to assist these individuals in leaving their home countries.
• Please also note that IIE-SRF does not grant fellowships to students seeking to continue their studies, including Ph.D. study, or to complete an academic training program. In addition, IIE-SRF typically does not consider applications from individuals who have been displaced or in exile for more than two years, or who hold citizenship or another permanent status in a second country.
• Applicants interested in the Baden-Württemberg Fund for Persecuted Scholars must meet the IIE-SRF eligibility criteria.
• Because of high demand for IIE-SRF assistance, the program is not able to grant fellowship support to all applicants who meet the minimum eligibility requirements.
• Please direct any inquiries regarding eligibility to [email protected]. To request an initial assessment of eligibility, an applicant may first submit the application coversheet, a current CV, academic statement, and personal statement for review.