Humanitarian Protection Initiative Request for Proposals

Past HPI funding rounds have highlighted that strong proposals will include: 

1. Direct connection to HPI scope (conflict setting and protection outcomes), listed in HPI’s RFP Overview (pages 6-10 in the document linked below), showing how the research proposed would further these priorities, especially generalizability and innovation.
2. Demonstrating the research’s policy relevance and potential to advance the current academic understanding of certain areas of research based on theory and previous literature. 
3. Level of partner or project development commensurate with the proposal type. The partner's letter should show a clear understanding of what the impact evaluation will entail for their operations, and what they explain to learn from it. Applicants that are still developing a partner relationship or have not yet addressed implementation risks may want to consider applying for travel/proposal development grants to further develop their ideas.
4. Refrain from allocating a significant proportion (if not all) of the budget to staff time. For pilot and Full RCTs, Applicants are encouraged to prioritize funding allocation to data collection in the field and relevant staff needed for such data collection. 
5. Clear and concise language, laying out their intentions and core details (e.g. research design, implementing partner relationships, etc.) in an organized and simple way.

No. Pilot grants are for studies with clear research questions, identified interventions, and established partnerships, but which require substantial upfront investments in design, measurement, and/or implementation before a full impact evaluation can be designed and a full study proposal can be submitted. The risk of submitting a small RCT as a pilot proposal is that there will be no clear findings due to being underpowered. Activities of a pilot grant could include testing intervention uptake to refine power calculations, developing new measurement strategies or instruments, analysis of existing data, piloting survey questions, refining the research logistics with the partner to make sure the research and program can be delivered as planned, and/or new data development or collection. These awards are for piloting research, not the intervention.

You are eligible to apply for HPI if you are a J-PAL affiliate, a J-PAL postdoc, a J-PAL invited researcher and a PhD student who has a J-PAL affiliate or invited researcher on their thesis committee. 
Researchers who are not yet part of the J-PAL researchers’ network are also eligible to apply if they hold a PhD, have a primary affiliation with a university and are based in or from an LMIC. Learn more about HPI’s LMIC Scholars program.

HPI RFP 3 funding decisions will be announced in July 2025 with contracting expected to take 3-6 months. If the timeline of this RFP cycle will undermine the project’s feasibility you could alternatively consider an off-cycle application. Please contact us at [email protected] if you would like to apply for an off-cycle proposal. 

The initiative team will be reviewing LOIs and full proposals on a rolling basis. The initiative team may share feedback on the content of the application if necessary and will follow up with the team if the application materials are incomplete. We encourage applicants to submit their applications before the deadline to allow the initiative team to review and provide feedback. 

HPI Scholar applicants who are successful at the LOI stage will be invited to discuss their proposal with J-PAL staff members to strengthen their application.

If a full proposal does not receive funding, the initiative team will share an email back with the applicant and provide feedback.

When applying to HPI, consider whether your proposal may be better suited for one of the following initiatives, which often cover similar geographies and also emphasize supporting innovation and research that maximizes generalizability (and with it, broad policy relevance). While the priority questions of HPI, CVI, and IPA’s Peace & Recovery Initiative may overlap, HPI has a much greater emphasis on protection in acute conflict settings. CVI focuses on crime and criminal justice issues and P&R has a broader focus on state and institution building and post-crisis recovery.

If you are uncertain about whether your proposal falls within the HPI’s scope, e-mail [email protected].

Please note that your proposal will only be reviewed by the board members of one initiative. J-PAL and IPA will not duplicate funding. If you are applying for a Full RCT and seeking co-funding from another initiative because your project cost is more than US$350, 000, please email the HPI team to let them know.

Yes. We limit HPI applications per researcher to a maximum of three in a 12-month period (PI or co-PI), which can be a combination of different project types (e.g. two pilots and one randomized evaluation).

Our team is glad to facilitate connections between potential partners and J-PAL’s network of researchers. We would be interested in hearing more about your organization and the program or policy you are interested in evaluating so we can identify if there are researchers in our network who may be available and interested. 

Please check out our matchmaking form for more information or contact our team at [email protected].

HPI is able to fund research projects for PhD students advised by a J-PAL affiliated researcher of up to US$50,000, and we aim for the majority of this support to go directly to the research. Otherwise, all normal HPI budget policies apply. Please note that we do not cover the tuition of PhD students.

Implementation costs are expected to be borne by the project partners. However, under some circumstances, HPI can fund implementation costs where it is a marginal addition to an existing program to offset costs from an experiment (e.g. adding an additional treatment arm or the costs of an encouragement design). These types of costs might include travel, small participant incentives, and/or SMS fees.

Yes. J-PAL requires that the reviewing IRB have IORG status with the US Office of Human Protections. An IRB’s status can be found by consulting the database of IORGs here.

Yes. The PI named on  a subaward issued by MIT’s Research Administration Services must be employed by the organization receiving the subaward and funds. This individual is fully responsible for the implementation of the research project per the proposal and with appropriate research and data protection practices. IRB approval must be held by the institution that enters into the subaward agreement with MIT. The IRB approval must be held by the Institute to Receive the Award (ITRA) and name the same PI that is affiliated with the ITRA.  If the institution does not have its own IRB, it must engage the services of a commercial IRB to review and provide oversight for its research activities. 

Please see the J-PAL Human Subjects Memo 2023 for full details. Email [email protected] and [email protected] if you have any questions.