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I am a PhD student in one of the social sciences going on the market. A large organization funded part of my dissertation research, as part of a research partnership. I wrote a report for them with some of the data in return. The total funding was a couple hundred thousand dollars, which is a lot in my field.

I was hoping to list the funder and the amount in my CV and cover letter to demonstrate my record of linking my research with funding.

The organization however insists that specific funding figures are confidential and I cannot use the precise number of the total funding.

Without the ability to put the specific number, what is a tasteful way to indicate in my job application that I received this large amount of research support?

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    My CV had a "grants and awards" section for exactly this kind of information, including "~100,000EUR". Or is this too specific?
    – Fábio Dias
    Aug 18, 2017 at 18:47
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    My grants are matter of public record. I put ~100k because I was too lazy to get the actual number. And for CVs the approximated value is enough IMHO, nobody really cares if it was 101k or 120k. Now, 100k x 200k is more relevant.
    – Fábio Dias
    Aug 18, 2017 at 19:08
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    Even if you can't put the exact amount, you can say what it covered! This should be pretty clear about the magnitude - e.g. "covered 2 years of salary" or "funded survey of X people using Y methods"
    – AJK
    Aug 19, 2017 at 4:47
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    The organization however insists that specific funding figures are confidential — That is truly weird. Most funding agencies like to brag about how they use their money.
    – JeffE
    Aug 19, 2017 at 16:42
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    A large organization funded part of my dissertation research, as part of a research partnership. Did you write the grant proposal?
    – henning
    Feb 12, 2018 at 9:23

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The (main) reason you can't just blurt that out in your CV is that it's not necessarily relevant:

Company X partnered with my university in a Billion-dollar-funded research project and I'm one of the Ph.D. candidates in it.

Suppose I said that. Well, so what if it was a Billion-dollar collaboration? Did I broker the deal? Did I propose the project? Was I in charge of coordination? If not then it really doesn't matter.

In your case, if you actually had a contribution to the collaboration other than being selected to do a Ph.D. - write a few sentences about what you actually did. Those sentences could at the same time illustrate the large scale (inn terms of people, organizational commitment, impact, time etc.) of the project and why you deserve some credit for it.

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Presumably, the money went directly to you, as opposed to being managed through a University account through the University. If that was the case, and if your University is a public institution, the funding amount can be subject to a FOIA.

Listing the exact funding amount on a CV is expected in the social sciences, at least it would be in R-1 universities (in the United States). However, if you have an agreement with the funding agency that the amount is confidential, then it has to be honored. You cannot signal that it was very large. If you want to signal this information, I suggest you get written permission from the funding agency.

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