The SRA Symposium - College of Medicine

We offer various trainings at both the department and college levels—arranging a special meeting
time or joining a regularly scheduled departmental meeting. These trainings include a combined
“finding funding/submission process” presentation, hands-on funding searches within a computer
lab using various searchable databases, and special sessions presented by visiting program officers.
ISU hosted a regional NEH meeting on campus last year and brought several program officers
from the State of Illinois on campus. This fall, we will be hosting an NSF day with program officers.
This will be open to any institution in the state of Illinois.
Sponsored Programs has devised several incentives programs in our attempts to encourage grantwriting
efforts. Several universities are offering similar incentives. A travel award program was
instituted to provide funds for travel to meet with program officers, and/or cooperating institutions
if directly related to grant-writing. The grant-writing initiative award is a new competitive
program designed to provide dollars as an incentive to write grants as well. A recognition reception
is held each spring to acknowledge all faculty/staff who submitted grants in the previous
year—funded or not
Some of the development activities aimed at the pre-submission stage are meetings with external
funding agencies with the goal being to build relationships for future projects, and further into
the lifecycle of a project, facilitating the application process. There have been appointments with
agency and program officers in Chicago, Springfield, and Washington, DC, about specific grant
opportunities and research interests.
Another activity we engage in is to arrange “brown bag” lunches with various faculty to discuss
common research interests and potential funding sources. These are promoted as multi-disciplinary
efforts. Topics covered in the past include bioterrorism, geriatrics, teacher recruitment, and
nursing. We also will “shop” projects to various funding agencies—researching hot topics, and
then promoting those programs within the university that meet each funding agency’s priorities.
And lastly, our assistant director in the development area will act as an ad hoc team member—
writing abstract proposals, taking minutes at meetings and disseminating, and setting goals for the
team. If external partners are identified, he arranges meetings with those individuals and coordinates
the effort.
The objective for all of these activities is to develop: (a) new ideas, (b) programs from existing
ideas, and (c) relationships with collaborators and funding agencies to promote the programs. The
ultimate aim is to increase external funding providing resources that will allow the university to
meet the needs of the student population and promote the transfer of services and technology to
the general public.
Conclusion
Papers
The rapid changes in society both in U.S. and internationally will cause institution of higher learning
to have to become adaptable and flexible for change. Sponsored Programs Offices will become
many times the drivers for change and will need to assist administration at institutions of higher
education to assist in meeting with the community and developing strategies for finding the funding
to provide services for projects, programs or centers.
Strategic or long-term planning is a complicated process that needs the input of many participants.
The questionnaire developed does not intend to take the place of these needed planning tools. Instead,
the purpose of this suggested planning tool is to assist Research and Sponsored Programs by
providing an abbreviated approach to begin assessing their ability to develop ways to respond to
opportunities and demands either internally (institution of higher education) or externally (state,
region or community) in providing additional services or demands.
2005 Symposium Proceedings Book 159