Fourth-year PhD candidate Irene Barrios has been awarded a 2026 Rapoport Doctoral Dissertation Grant by the Rapoport Family Foundation. These grants provide up to $15,000 to support dissertation survey research in American political behavior for PhD students.
Barrios will use the award to assist with conducting interviews and a large-scale, nationally representative survey experiment to ask her research questions. Her doctoral research is titled, "The Allyship Gap: How Black Americans Evaluate White Political Representation Post-BLM."
Founded in 2019, the Rapoport Family Foundation is committed to supporting a broadly diverse group of scholars by ensuring that the applicants, grant panel, and grantees represent diverse demographic backgrounds, including individuals from underrepresented populations, and research interests. The Foundation has three focus areas:
- Political Behavior Research: Support research in American political behavior by PhD students. This is done primarily through the Rapoport Summer Research Collaborative and the Dissertation Program.
- Civic Engagement Seed Funding: Provide seed funding to new, innovative projects and organizations seeking to improve civic engagement in the United States.
- Political Bridging Efforts: Support efforts to bridge divisive partisanship in the United States.
