Upcoming Events & Deadlines

Planning and Writing Successful Grant Proposals in the Creative Arts, Social Sciences, and Humanities Seminar promotional image

Planning and Writing Successful Grant Proposals in the Creative Arts, Social Sciences, and Humanities Seminar

Thursday, January 14, 2027 8:30am to 12:30pm
Iowa Memorial Union (IMU)

The Research Development Office is hosting an in-person grant writing seminar, Planning and Writing Successful Grant Proposals in the Creative Arts, Social Sciences, and Humanities, that will be held on Wednesday, Jan. 13 from 1:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m. and Thursday, Jan. 14 from 8:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. in the IMU. The seminar is presented by AtKisson Training Group.

This seminar will cover fundamental concepts of proposal planning and writing for the Arts and Humanities faculty backed by concrete...

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...

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News

Sharon Yam and Natalie Fixmer-Oraiz

A Project Postponed: Scholars Take Interdisciplinary Grant Project on the Road

When the pandemic postponed Natalie Fixmer-Oraiz (Communication Studies and GWSS, University of Iowa) and Shui-yin Sharon Yam's (Writing, Rhetoric, and Digital Studies, University of Kentucky) Obermann residency for their Interdisciplinary Research Grant project last summer, they decided to postpone their work until they could meet in person. Though the Center remained closed to faculty this...
John Rapson sitting at the piano

John Rapson: Looking Back at a Generous Collaborator

In the summer of 2014, it wasn't uncommon to find two faculty members padding around the Obermann Center in bare feet as they dashed from their upstairs offices to the downstairs library to watch movies. While it appeared to be a scholarly form of summer camp, John Rapson (School of Music) and Paul Kalina (Theatre) were deep in research as they broke down how music and movement interacted in old...
Virtual Reality Screenshot

Using Virtual Reality to Train Math Teachers

Most children in the U.S. struggle to learn mathematics, with 50 to 75% of students scoring below proficient on achievement tests in grades 4 through 12. Children with disabilities such as autism tend to fare even worse. Clearly, math teachers must be equipped to educate students who require varying levels of support—but, for the most part, they aren’t. Logistical issues inherent in conventional...
Dominic Dongilli at his internship

Summer Interns at the Halfway Mark: A growing tomato, a gift from Brokaw, and nudity in the archives

It is around the halfway point of so many projects when the work is most difficult. The newness has worn off; the end is still out of reach, but close enough to give us an uneasy reminder of how much is yet to be completed. This is the experience of the ten UI graduate students who are at the midway point of their Humanities for the Public Good (HPG) internships. For eight weeks, they are working...
Teachers and children in classroom

A Thousand Prospects for Research: A Spelman Rockefeller Community Scholar Reflects

In late summer 2020, a new community initiative was formed in response to the impact of the pandemic on K12 students: Neighborhood NESTS. The Obermann Center responded by creating a new graduate research position, the Obermann Spelman Rockefeller Community Scholar, to work with the initiative, providing program management and deepening the project through disciplinary research. In this article...

Brain Time: Rodica Curtu, Mathematical Biology, and the Perception of Time

For Rodica Curtu, math is a balm. In high school, when she’d get a headache, she’d sit down and solve math problems—“The opposite of what my friends would do!” she laughs. Now, as a professor in the Department of Mathematics (CLAS) and a member of the Iowa Neuroscience Institute, she uses mathematical analysis to help find treatments for people with debilitating brain disorders—specifically...

Recent Events

Iowa City International Documentary Film Festival promotional image

Iowa City International Documentary Film Festival

Thursday, April 23 to Sunday, April 26, 2026 (all day)
Adler Journalism and Mass Communication Building
The Iowa City International Film Festival is a student-run experimental film festival hosted in Iowa City.
Association of Ancient Historians Meeting 2026 promotional image

Association of Ancient Historians Meeting 2026

Saturday, April 18, 2026 (all day)
University of Iowa
Association of Ancient Historians Meeting 2026 supported by the Department of History, the College of Arts and Sciences, the Obermann Center, and the Perry A. and Helen J. Bond Fund for Interdisciplinary Interaction at the University of Iowa
Association of Ancient Historians Meeting 2026 promotional image

Association of Ancient Historians Meeting 2026

Friday, April 17 to Saturday, April 18, 2026 (all day)
University of Iowa
Association of Ancient Historians Meeting 2026 supported by the Department of History, the College of Arts and Sciences, the Obermann Center, and the Perry A. and Helen J. Bond Fund for Interdisciplinary Interaction at the University of Iowa
Association of Ancient Historians Meeting 2026 promotional image

Association of Ancient Historians Meeting 2026

Thursday, April 16 to Saturday, April 18, 2026 (all day)
University of Iowa
Association of Ancient Historians Meeting 2026 supported by the Department of History, the College of Arts and Sciences, the Obermann Center, and the Perry A. and Helen J. Bond Fund for Interdisciplinary Interaction at the University of Iowa
Global Vaccines in a Time of Climate Change, Megacities, and Antiscience promotional image

Global Vaccines in a Time of Climate Change, Megacities, and Antiscience

Friday, April 10, 2026 4:30pm to 5:15pm
Biology Building East
Peter Hotez addresses the global challenges facing vaccination efforts, including climate change, urbanization, and organized antiscience movements.
The DTP Vaccine and Narratives of Injury promotional image

The DTP Vaccine and Narratives of Injury

Friday, April 10, 2026 3:45pm to 4:30pm
Biology Building East
Tara Smith explores the history of the DTP vaccine and the narratives that shape public perception of vaccine injury.