Pierson College Mellon Senior Forums

Mellon Forums at Pierson College seek to foster in our Seniors the sense of belonging to the community of scholars. The Mellon Forum provides funding dedicated to academic research for Pierson senior essay projects. Culminating in the form of a dinner and presentations to which both Seniors and Fellows of the College are invited. This provides some of our most talented students the opportunity to present the results of their independent research projects. The Forums also offer the possibility of especially close interaction between the Head of College, the Dean, and Pierson Seniors in comfortable and intimate surroundings. Pierson holds a number of Forums during the spring semester. 

After dinner is served, two students deliver presentations, usually eighteen-twenty minutes in length, to an audience of Seniors, Pierson Fellows, and Yale community. Attempts are made to cover a wide range of topics in various branches of the Humanities, the Social Sciences, and the Natural Sciences. Each presentation is immediately followed by a lively question and answer period (10 mins).

Please review the Virtual Info-Session recording held on October 1, 2025, for more information.

Mellon Forums are convened by Diana Onco-Ingyadet, Pierson College Resident Fellow.

If you are an interested Pierson senior and have questions, please email diana.onco-ingyadet@yale.edu. The application can be found on the Yale College Student Grants Database. Announcements for each Forum will be emailed to Pierson Seniors prior to each event.

Frequently Asked Questions:

Applications will open on September 17, 2025, and grants will be awarded in November/December 2025. The final submission date for applications will be Wednesday, November 5, 2025. Early submission is highly recommended. 

The maximum individual award amount is $500.

Successful grant applicants are required to present their research at one of the Forums scheduled throughout the spring semester.

Unfortunately, no. Given the interest and number of awardees each year, we typically do not have capacity to accept any volunteer presentations. 

Unfortunately, no we cannot award juniors. The Pierson Mellon is only able to fund seniors, and the awards are dispersed in the fall, so third semester juniors are ineligible. 

No, there is no appeal process. All decisions are final, and our fall deadline is firm. Any submissions after the deadline will not be accepted. 

Applications must provide a budget outlining any costs that are necessary for the completion of their research, ie. travel to access archives, travel to interview specific communities/people/institutions, software or technology needed to complete research, etc. 

Below are some examples of past submission requests:

  • Field visits to Chinatowns with significant Fuzhounese populations to interview community members.
  • Oral interviews among impacted populations in Southwestern Pennsylvania.
  • Develop a transferable Lagrangian emissions profile model to describe the speciation and quantification of cooking VOCs and their atmospheric reactivity in urban environments, specifically, New York City.

  • Explore the archive of the legislation’s sponsor, Senator John D. Rockefeller IV of West Virginia located in an archive at West Virginia University West Virginia & Regional History Center