Upcoming Events

Eleanor Waltzes: Women’s Poetry and Music for Eleanor Roosevelt During the Great Depression promotional image

Eleanor Waltzes: Women’s Poetry and Music for Eleanor Roosevelt During the Great Depression

Saturday, September 26, 2026 3:00pm
Voxman Music Building

“Eleanor Waltzes” honors First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt through performances of songs and poetry created and sent to her by American women. The event will also feature an exhibit of materials from the Iowa Women’s Archives and a “making do” reception with 1930s recipes. “Eleanor Waltzes” is part of Sounding the Nation at 250, a series of commemorative concerts surrounding the U.S. Semiquincentennial sponsored by the Society for American Music.

Saturday, September 26, 2026, 3 pm

Recital Hall, Voxman...

Registration Deadline: Junior Faculty and Graduate Student Session with Walter Biggins, Obermann Editor-in-Residence promotional image

Registration Deadline: Junior Faculty and Graduate Student Session with Walter Biggins, Obermann Editor-in-Residence

Wednesday, September 30, 2026 (all day)
111 Church Street

University of Iowa junior faculty and graduate students at all stages are invited to join Walter Biggins—editor-in-chief at the University of Pennsylvania Press—for a light breakfast and a conversation about turning an article, thesis, or dissertation into a book on Tuesday, Oct. 6, from 9–10:30 a.m. at the Obermann Center for Advanced Studies library. Please bring any questions you have about that process or about scholarly publishing in general.

Register by Wednesday, September 30.

Biggins is...

Registration Deadline: Undergraduate Career Session with Walter Biggins, Obermann Editor-in-Residence promotional image

Registration Deadline: Undergraduate Career Session with Walter Biggins, Obermann Editor-in-Residence

Wednesday, September 30, 2026 (all day)
111 Church Street

Interested in a career in publishing? In this session on Tuesday, Oct. 6, at noon at the Obermann Center for Advanced Studies, Walter Biggins, editor-in-chief at University of Pennsylvania Press, will discuss his career path and editorial work. This is an opportunity for students to hear directly from a distinguished professional about the realities of the field and to gain insight into how to prepare for a career in publishing. Pizza will be provided!

Please register by Wednesday, September 30.

B...

RSVP Deadline: AMA with Walter Biggins, Obermann Editor-in-Residence promotional image

RSVP Deadline: AMA with Walter Biggins, Obermann Editor-in-Residence

Wednesday, September 30, 2026 (all day)
111 Church Street

UI faculty, students, and staff are invited to attend ask-me-anything group discussions with Walter Biggins—editor-in-chief at University of Pennsylvania Press—at 1 p.m. and 3 p.m. on Monday, Oct. 1 at the Obermann Center for Advanced Studies. Questions might address finding an editor, pitching a book, writing a book proposal, how the publishing process works, etc.

There will be two back-to-back discussions; you may attend one or both.

Please RSVP by Wednesday, September 30.

Free and open to all.

Bi...

View more events

Spacer

Upcoming Application Deadlines

Upcoming Application Deadlines

Application Deadline: Obermann International Fellowships (Spring 2027) promotional image

Application Deadline: Obermann International Fellowships (Spring 2027)

Friday, September 18, 2026 11:59pm
111 Church Street

The UI Obermann Center for Advanced studies is accepting applications for Spring 2027 Obermann International Fellowships. This program offers dedicated space, time, and funding for interdisciplinary scholars to collaborate on innovative research at the University of Iowa. Up to eight international fellowships will be granted every academic year. Applicants must be active researchers at an accredited institution of higher learning outside of the United States or independent researchers/artists...

Application Deadline: Book Ends, Obermann Book Completion Workshop promotional image

Application Deadline: Book Ends, Obermann Book Completion Workshop

Wednesday, September 23, 2026 5:00pm
Virtual

Books Ends supports University of Iowa faculty from disciplines in which publishing a monograph is required for tenure and promotion. The award is designed to assist UI faculty members of all ranks and with significant research responsibilities to turn promising manuscripts into important, field-changing, published books.

Book Ends brings together a panel of senior scholars for a candid, constructive three-hour virtual workshop on a faculty member’s book manuscript. The award provides a $500...

Application Deadline: Obermann Interdisciplinary Research Grants (Summer 2027) promotional image

Application Deadline: Obermann Interdisciplinary Research Grants (Summer 2027)

Wednesday, October 7, 2026 5:00pm
111 Church Street

Obermann Interdisciplinary Research Grants (IDRG) foster collaborative scholarship and creative work by offering recipients time and space to exchange new ideas leading to invention, creation, and publication. IDRG groups work at the Obermann Center for two weeks, usually in July and/or August. Applicants propose work on a project with colleagues from across the University, across disciplines within their own department, or with colleagues from other parts of the country or the world. Projects...

Application Deadline: Obermann Symposium Directorship (2027–28) promotional image

Application Deadline: Obermann Symposium Directorship (2027–28)

Wednesday, October 28, 2026 5:00pm
111 Church Street

Is there a burning topic in your discipline or a topic that cuts across disciplines that we should bring to campus? Is there a format for the conversation that can energize an intellectual community around that topic? That might be the perfect topic for an Obermann Symposium!

In addition to a compelling topic, we invite co-directors to propose national and international speakers who can offer richly diverse perspectives on the symposium theme. We also want to highlight the work of UI and local...

Application Deadline: Small Important Project Grants promotional image

Application Deadline: Small Important Project Grants

Thursday, April 1, 2027 5:00pm
111 Church Street

This new Obermann Center program offers modest yet swift support for those portions of research and creative endeavors by UI scholars that are important toward advancing a project but do not have enough funding from other sources. We will grant 10 awards of $500 or less per academic year. Note that funds need to be spent by June 30 of each year.

Eligibility: Open to all University of Iowa faculty and staff researchers who have not received a SIP award in the past academic year.

Application...

Application Deadline: Obermann Working Groups (2027–30) promotional image

Application Deadline: Obermann Working Groups (2027–30)

Wednesday, April 7, 2027 5:00pm
111 Church Street

Obermann Center Working Groups provide space, structure, and discretionary funding for groups led by faculty that may include advanced graduate students, staff members, and community members with a shared intellectual interest.

Groups have used this opportunity to share their work in progress or draw up a set of readings they want to undertake and discuss. Others have organized conferences, applied for grants together, written articles together, designed new courses, taken field trips, organized...

News

music_therapy_2.png

Music Therapy

The nurses at the University of Iowa Children’s Hospital were bothered by the high pain ratings from kids who had gone through spinal fusion for scoliosis. But one of the therapies that received high ratings for helping with pain was music therapy.This is how Mary Adamek, clinical professor of Music Therapy, and Kirsten Nelson, UI Children’s Hospital music therapist, got the idea to develop a...

Recent Events

Graduate Student Writing Group Session & Social promotional image

Graduate Student Writing Group Session & Social

Tuesday, April 8, 2025 11:00am to 1:00pm
111 Church Street

The Obermann Center for Advanced Studies, in collaboration with Grad Success & Belonging, is hosting a writing group followed by a social for Graduate & Professional Student Appreciation Week. This writing group session facilitated by two grad ambassadors will offer community and accountability to Iowa's graduate and professional students working on any kind of academic writing project (academic articles/essays, fellowship or grant applications, dissertations, book projects, etc.). The session...

Mutations and Permutations of Care: Graduate Conference promotional image

Mutations and Permutations of Care: Graduate Conference

Saturday, April 5, 2025 9:00pm to 2:00am
Schaeffer Hall
From Silent Spring to Silent Night: A Tale of Toads and Men. A public talk by Tyrone B. Hayes promotional image

From Silent Spring to Silent Night: A Tale of Toads and Men. A public talk by Tyrone B. Hayes

Saturday, April 5, 2025 11:30am
Phillips Hall

Tyrone Hayes is the Judy Chandler Webb Distinguished Chair for Innovative Teaching and Research and a professor in the Department of Integrative Biology at UC Berkeley. His research focuses on the role of steroid hormones in amphibian development and he conducts both laboratory and field studies in the U.S. and Africa. The two main areas of interest are metamorphosis and sex differentiation, but he is also interested in growth (larval and adult) and hormonal regulation of aggressive behavior...

Science, the State, and the Public Trust: Historical Perspectives. A Panel Discussion promotional image

Science, the State, and the Public Trust: Historical Perspectives. A Panel Discussion

Saturday, April 5, 2025 10:45am
Phillips Hall

A discussion of historical perspectives on science, the state, and the public trust with Department of History faculty Viridiana Hernández Fernández, Shane Bobrycki, Robert Rouphail, Nicholas Yablon, and Beth Yale

This event is part of Iowa City Darwin Day Science Fest, a celebration of science and its many contributions to humanity, which takes place on April 3, 4 & 5. The 2025 speakers are Tyrone Hayes (UC Berkeley), Chris Jones (Iowa Driftless Water Defenders), and David Cwiertny (Civil...

A Healthy Iowa Needs Clean Water: A public talk by David Cwiertny promotional image

A Healthy Iowa Needs Clean Water: A public talk by David Cwiertny

Saturday, April 5, 2025 10:00am
Phillips Hall

David Cwiertny is the William D. Ashton Professor of Civil Engineering and Director of the Environmental Policy Research Program at the University of Iowa. His research specializes in the development of nanomaterials based approaches for resource sustainability and the environmental occurrence, fate and effects of emerging pollutant classes. At the UI, he directs the state-funded Center for Health Effects of Environmental Contamination, which conducts research to identify, measure, and prevent...

Mutations and Permutations of Care: Graduate Conference promotional image

Mutations and Permutations of Care: Graduate Conference

Friday, April 4, 2025 9:00pm to 6:00pm
Schaeffer Hall