Artists as Catalysts

Artists as Catalysts Navigation Image

Beyond Incarceration

A side profile of a Black poet who is wearing glasses and a hat with a feather hat pin.

Civic Engagement

A man in a brown jacket stands in front of blue bulletin board that is covered with papers and advertisements  

Evolving Higher Education

A vertical image of an Indigenous person who is sitting on a chair in front of a backdrop.

Expanding Public Knowledge

An interior room filled with audio and video equipment 

Monuments and Memory

A multicolored painted totem pole set in front of a foggy forest landscape

Multivocality

Five people stand together in a group photo. They are laughing and smiling.

Power of the Word

Five colorful neon signs hang on the wall with messages that include, "Freedom cannot wait," "Brown owned," and "America is for Dreamers."

Public Places‚ Public Stories

A group of Indigenous Maskoke people stand and sit in the wooden frame of a structure in a woods

Puerto Rico and Its Diaspora

In a vertical image, a black leather vest is adorned with colorful pins across the front of it. Embroidery on the vest reads: "Felícitas "La Prieta" Méndez" 

University Everywhere

Students walk through the campus of the University of Hawaii

Mission AdobeStock 420526748 1440x1800V

Mission

History iStock-1313300194 vert

History

Grantmaking areas

Grantmaking Areas

People iStock-1311055822 vert

People

Financials navigation image

Financials

News iStock-1406026883 vert

News

Events iStock-1323998165 vert

Events

Established in 1988 to address the barriers that result in the problem of underrepresentation in the faculty ranks of higher education, the Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship (MMUF) is committed to supporting a diverse professoriate and to promoting the value of multivocality in the humanities and related disciplines, elevating accounts, interpretations, and narratives that expand present understandings. Its name honors Dr. Benjamin E. Mays, the noted African American educator, statesman, minister, and former president of Morehouse College.

Founded with an initial cohort of eight member institutions, the program has grown to include forty-seven member schools and three consortia, including the UNCF consortium of Historically Black Colleges and Universities.

Thus far the program has produced more than 1,100 PhDs, almost 800 of whom are currently college professors and 300 of whom have taken their humanities training into venues ranging from museums and nonprofit organizations to publishing houses and government positions. At any given time, about 800 MMUF fellows are enrolled in PhD programs, while the fellowship supports approximately 500 undergraduate students each year.

Through a pipeline process that emphasizes mentoring, research support, programming, and student cohort building, Mellon partners with member colleges and universities to identify and support students of great promise and help them become scholars and professionals of the highest distinction.

MMUF is proud of its legacy of field-transforming scholars whose diverse perspectives greatly enrich the experiences of their students.


About MMUF

Though most MMUF PhDs go on to teach at the university level, our fellows are also employed in higher ed administration, nonprofits, museums and libraries, publishing, government, medicine, and law.

PhDs earned

A critical mass of MMUF PhDs is now transforming teaching and scholarship in the humanities and social sciences.

College and university faculty and instructors

Over 500 MMUF PhDs now hold positions as tenure-track, tenured, or full professors.

Tenured and tenure-track professors

MMUF at a glance

Contact us

Each year, new MMUF undergraduate fellows are selected from applicants in the rising junior classes of MMUF member institutions. These fellows join the rising and graduating senior fellows in their institution’s MMUF program, where they are provided with mentoring and financial support as they prepare for entry into PhD programs and eventual careers as scholars and faculty members. 

The MMUF program also supports fellows enrolled in PhD programs in eligible fields through a suite of programmatic events and grant opportunities. This support continues beyond graduate school into fellows’ postdoctoral and faculty careers.

How the MMUF program works

MMUF Fellows attend a conference at Columbia University in New York City. Photo: courtesy of Social Science Research Council

A large group of diverse people stand on a stairway and look at the photographer for a posed photo.

I’m more secure of who I am and the ideas I have. I’m proud that I am able to stand by the person that I’ve become.

This is something we can do, like academics, scholars, these are actual jobs that we can obtain.

Getting through college, it’s just given me this unwavering faith in myself.

I don’t think I was capable of that much, but here I am. I persevered through.

I realized the power of coming as I am into spaces and not trying to be perfect all the time.

Learning that the path in academia is just so fluid taught me to just have faith ... a path will open up.

Commencement Group

While every student in the class of 2024 has a different story to tell, their collective undergraduate experience unfolded during an unprecedented time in human history.

Wisdom from the Class of 2024 

Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship program participant Ben Vinson III, PhD, has been selected as the 18th president of Howard University.

MMUF PhD Ben Vinson Announced as Howard University’s Next President

Dr. Sean Decatur, the first MMUF fellow to become a college president, has been named president of the American Museum of Natural History. Dr. Decatur became president of Kenyon College in 2013. 

MMUF PhD Sean Decatur Named President of American Museum of Natural History

MMUF PhD Imani Perry Wins National Book Award

When Howard University named Ben Vinson III ’92 president earlier this month, it marked a milestone for the Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship. 

Dartmouth logo

Mellon Mays Fellowships at Dartmouth Have National Impact

Armando I. Bengochea (left), senior program officer and director of the Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Program, and Phillip Brian Harper (right), program director. 

Headshots of Armando I. Bengochea and Phillip Brian Harper

Mellon program leaders offer their thoughts on new work that is uniquely positioned to meet some of the most pressing issues of the moment.

A Q&A with Higher Learning Leadership

New in 2022, “Humanities for All Times” meets growing undergraduate interest in social justice by supporting projects that teach humanities skills and methods necessary to transformational change.

New Initiative Supports Liberal Arts Colleges Providing Social Justice-Oriented Offerings

An article from “Inside Philanthropy” about the strategic shift in Mellon Foundation’s grantmaking to higher learning and other areas.

Inside Philanthropy logo

How Did Mellon’s Pivot to Social Justice Affect its Higher Ed Grantmaking?

Forging a just academy and shaping the future of the humanities

Diversifying the professoriate is labor-intensive and requires the real and active intellectual and social commitment of busy scholars and administrators.