How Small Institutions Decide What to Fund

Funding decisions are usually described in terms of criteria. In practice they are shaped by who is in the room, what was funded last year, and how much energy the panel has left by the final application.

Method

Six funders, eleven panel observations, twenty-eight interviews conducted over nine months. Notes were coded for the reasoning actually voiced, not the criteria formally cited.

Findings

• Precedent carried more weight than any written criterion
• Applications reviewed late in a session were systematically scored lower
• Panels self-corrected when a single member articulated an explicit counterfactual