They were Anglican Family Care director Nicola Taylor and Thankyou Payroll chief executive Lani Evans, both of Dunedin, and Community Trust of Southland chief executive John Prendergast, of Invercargill.
Community and Voluntary Sector Minister Jo Goodhew said the 14 recipients were ''typical New Zealanders studying extraordinary things''.
This year, the trust board provided $88,500 to 14 fellows for research projects.
Mrs Taylor will explore different ways of responding to the acute social problems faced by indigenous children, such as child poverty and family violence.
She would examine the Canadian responses to these problems and learn different ways of responding, such as collective impact or community engagement models.
Ms Evans will travel to the United Kingdom and the United States to learn from organisations involved with devolved decision-making in the philanthropic sector.
The study would explore what happened when decision-making was handed to communities and examine the effectiveness of the practices used and the appetite for implementing the decision-making model in New Zealand.
Mr Prendergast will research the leadership of philanthropic trusts and the development and use of social finance, such as social loans or bonds, in the United Kingdom.
Trust board chairwoman Rachael Selby said the board was excited to fund research projects on topics ranging from ''society's most pressing problems'' to those which enhanced New Zealanders lives.
The trust aimed to help New Zealanders travel overseas and bring back new insights and understanding to enrich their community and, ultimately, New Zealand, she said.
