RHS Panel Grants, of £1500 per award, support the formation of panels to present, in-person, research on a shared historical theme at an academic conference, or equivalent event, in history or a cognate discipline. Launched in 2025, this is the second year of this programme which is generously supported by the Scouloudi Foundation.
About the Panel Grants programme
The scheme will support the creation of panels, of up to four principal participants, whose formation would not otherwise have been possible, in their entirety, due to an absence of financial support.
In establishing this programme, the Society seeks to make possible collaborative conference participation and research dissemination at a time when budgets for event attendance and travel have been cut. The scheme also aims to support panel membership by independent historians with no access to funding for conference participation.
The call for the 2026-27 round of grants is now open. Applications must be made via the RHS applications portal.
Applications are invited between 23 March 2026 and the closing date of 11.59PM on 5 June 2026.
Our thanks to the Scouloudi Foundation for its generous support of the second year of this programme.
Grants support historians to form panels to present historical work, in-person, on a shared theme, at a specific conference or equivalent. Funding of £1500 per panel will be made available to support the following costs associated with the creation of and presentation by a panel:
- conference or event attendance fees;
- travel to the conference, in line with the Society’s expenses and carbon policy;
- accommodation, if required, and reasonable expenses for the duration of the conference.
The venue of the specified conference will depend on the location of panel members. However, the extent of funding available means grants will most likely be given for panels taking place in a home country or a close neighbouring country: for example, for UK applicants this will most likely mean attendance at an event in the United Kingdom or Europe.
Eligibility for a Panel Grant, 2026-27
Applications are invited for panels that address a coherent and common subject area, relating (but not limited) to:
- any historical topic or question, not limited by chronology or geography
- historical methodologies and practice;
- approaches to historical study and its promotion, e.g. public history, work by historians across professional sectors, interdisciplinary working with other practitioners in the arts, humanities, social sciences and/or STEM;
- teaching and/or the communication of history;
- analysis of and advocacy for the historical discipline and profession in higher education or other sectors.
Grants are available to historians those who are:
- at any career stage, from advanced PhD onwards;
- working either in higher education or as a professional historian in a related sector, e.g. museums, archives, heritage or broadcasting;
- engaged in scholarly research as an independent historian.
Successful panel applications will:
- comprise between three and four principal participants (independent of a chair) of whom at least one panellist (as lead applicant) will be a current Fellow or Member of the Royal Historical Society;
- involve speakers from at least two different institutions or organisations, where applicable;
- combine speakers at a range of career stages and backgrounds, including at least one early career historian (current completing or within five years of completion of a PhD);
- seek to bring into dialogue practitioners from a range of backgrounds: e.g. higher education; museum, archives and heritage; schools; and public or community history groups;
- be able to demonstrate the need for RHS funding to establish the panel due to the absence of alternative financial support;
- undertake a panel at a recognised academic conference held between 1 September 2026 and 31 July 2027;
- promote their panel as supported by the award of a ‘Scouloudi Panel Grant from the Royal Historical Society’;
- provide a short report / blog post for the Society on the panel as a collaborative exercise and its contribution to historical understanding, knowledge and/or practice, of value to others;
- receive an initial provisional award, followed by the transfer of funds on confirmation that their panel has been accepted by the conference (if confirmation is not possible by the date of this programme’s close and decision-making).
When awarding grants, primary consideration will be given to the proposed quality and value of the panel; the distinctiveness of a panel’s composition, drawing on historians’ varied affiliations within and beyond higher education; the suitability of a panel to the specified conference; and a demonstrable need for funding to facilitate the activity.
In this and all similar awards, the Society is keen to support historians who lack access to alternative resources (institutional or other) to enhance their work, or where funding opportunities are very limited.
Making an application for a Panel Grant, 2026-27
For this year’s call, applicants are required to submit the following via the RHS applications portal:
- panel proposal (750-1000 words max) setting out the subject and membership (maximum of four speakers) of the proposed panel; reasons for attending your selected conference; costings and budget for attendance.
- short CVs of panellists (1 page per panellist, 3 or 4 pages max) submitted as a single document.
Applications must be submitted via the Society’s applications portal.
Grant holders for the current year, 2025-26
Two panels received funding for the first year of this scheme:
- ‘Commons and Communities: Celebrating Professor Andy Wood’, with speakers Lily R. Chadwick, Mark Hailwood, Susannah Ottaway and Steve Hindle: to enable Lily Chadwick (Woodbrooke Centre, Birmingham) to participate in the panel, to take place at the 2025 meeting of the North American Conference on British Studies (NACBS) in Montreal in November.
- ‘Continuities and Challenges: Women’s Politics and Activism in 1970s Britain’, with speakers Jessica White, Caitríona Beaumont, Ruth Davidson, Lyndsey Jenkins, and Laura Beers: to support members of the panel without alternative means of institutional financial support to participate in the panel, to take place at the 2025 meeting of the North American Conference on British Studies (NACBS) in Montreal in November.
Questions about the Scouloudi Panel Grants, 2026-27, may be sent to: [email protected].