Knauss legislative fellowships in Congress help build careers — and they're fun and educational. See our video and fact sheet for details.
2026 Knauss Fellowships Awards and Schedules
Award Total: $78,100-$95,600
- $73,100 for your salary/stipend and personnel expenses (i.e. fringe benefits).
- $5,000 to cover other allowable expenses (relocation prior to the fellowship, academic tuition, journal publication fees, academic- and fellowship-related travel, conference fees, online trainings, and workshops.)
- Up to $17,500 for host office-related travel (dependent on host office selection) and/or placement week expenses.
Schedule
| December 2024 | NOAA releases 2025 Federal Funding Opportunity (NOAA-OAR-SG-2026-29505) and Maryland Sea Grant opens the Knauss Fellowship application process |
| Dec. 2024 - Feb. 2025 | Draft applications in eSeaGrant Candidate meetings with Maryland Sea Grant |
| 19 February 2025 at 5 PM | Fellowship applications submitted to Maryland Sea Grant by the official deadline |
| March 2025 | Maryland Sea Grant programs review packages, interview applicants |
| April 2, 2025 | Maryland Sea Grant panel selects applications for the national competition |
| May 2025 | National review panel and finalists selection |
| June 2025 | Applicants notified of application status |
| June 2025 | All applicants should reserve this time for finalists' orientation. While the event will be recorded, all finalists will be required to watch the information provided |
| July 2025 | Meet with Maryland Sea Grant to discuss upcoming fellowship before placement week |
| Fall-Winter | Placement week (virtual or in Washington, D.C.) |
| January 2026 | Meet with Maryland Sea Grant to complete paperwork |
| 13 January 2026 | Submit photo and biographical sketch to Maryland Sea Grant |
| January 2026 | Submit all required Human Resources paperwork to Maryland Sea Grant |
| 1 February 2026 | Fellowship starts |
| March 2026 | Knauss welcome reception and dinner on Capitol Hill |
| 31 January 2027 | Fellowship ends; final report due to Maryland Sea Grant and NOAA |
Program Announcements
News and Blogs
Featured Fellow
Nina Santos
Nina Santos is a Ph.D. student at the Chesapeake Biological Laboratory at the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science. For her dissertation, she is focused on small shrimp-like crustaceans called mysids – an understudied yet important part of many estuarine and coastal food webs.
Featured Research Project
Developing a habitat model for mysids, an important link in Chesapeake Bay food webs
Mysids are important mesozooplankton prey for many species of fish in Chesapeake Bay and are an important link in transferring energy from lower to upper trophic levels. Mysids also serve as biological vectors for benthic-pelagic coupling due to their diel vertical migration and omnivorous prey-switching behavior, which makes mysids important regulators of food web architecture. Despite their central role in coastal food webs, surprisingly little is known about mysid ecology and dynamics in Chesapeake Bay.
