Early Career Faculty Research Excellence Awards

Launching in fall 2025, the Early Career Faculty Research Excellence Awards (ECFREA) advance the University’s enduring commitment to the scholarship and creative activity of early career faculty across the ten-campus UC system. This new program builds on a range of existing programs and initiatives across the system designed to support thriving faculty careers at UC. 

The changing national landscape for research funding demands a renewed commitment and investment in the talent, achievement and promise of early career faculty at UC. The Early Career Faculty Research Excellence Awards program will make up to sixty competitive awards to early career faculty from across the UC system. Selected award recipients will receive a one-time $50,000 allocation beginning in 2026 to support their proposed research plan and associated allowable activities. These award recipients will represent the breadth of the excellence of the professoriate while accelerating the continued impact of UC in California, across the country and around the world.