Bob's Newsletter August 18, 2014 (Office of Research Services)

Hi Everyone,

 These are some Fall updates from Bob Damrauer in the Office of Research Services (ORS).

 Welcome to new faculty. Some changes are being made for your convenience on the ORS homepage (http://www.ucdenver.edu/ors), which may take several weeks to be completed. Mainly the changes involve navigation issues so you can find things a bit more easily. I’ll let you know when it is no longer under construction so you can have a look.

 A.     The first round of judging the large grants (up to $25,000) was completed in June with 14 submissions and five winners. Congratulations go to Professors Michelle Carpenter (CAM), Carrie Makarewicz/Jeremy Nemeth (CAP)(team proposal), Indrani Pal (CEAS), Christopher Phiel (CLAS), and Doug Shepard/Raibatak Das (CLAS)(team proposal),

 B.     The second round of judging of small grants (up to $3,000) was completed in Julywith eight submissions and four winners. Congratulations go to Professors Jody Beck (CAP), Michelle Carpenter (CAM), Ryan Crewe (CLAS), and Vinit Desai (Business).

 C.     Submissions to the small grant program can be made at any time. The next judging will be at the end of August. So far only a few proposals have been received.

 D.     The next submission date for the large grant program is September 25th.

 E.     Please read the grant programs announcement and obtain applications on our website at: http://www.ucdenver.edu/ors. As indicated in the grant programs announcement posted on this URL, a major principle in evaluating proposals is “the impact of the project on the submitters’ career.” That is really important! The announcement also emphasizes that our managing of funding support will be a balancing act, certainly one that will develop as we review more proposals.

 F.      Judging of all proposals is being done by a standing committee of some of us in ORS as well as some outsiders, all of whom have broad experience in evaluating proposals. It is critical, given the broad backgrounds of the standing committee, that you address your proposal to that group in terms that are understandable to a lay audience. We will not fund proposals that are not broadly understood. A few tips follow:

(1) We expect that requests for funding address questions about creative processes, whether they be in the arts, humanities, social sciences, sciences, or engineering. The awards committee wants and needs to understand the nature of the questions you are exploring and seeking to answer in the works you are planning to complete. The statement about research universities at the beginning of the funding initiative announcement places this in context.

(2) Requests for travel to conferences, hosting conferences and events, etc. without clearly addressing point (1) above will not be funded, not simply because ORS funding is limited, but because the connection between your career advancement and development and what defines the research office mission is a necessary connection that has to be made for funding.

 (3) We urge you to seek matching funding from your department, college, school, etc. We believe it extremely important for you to be actively engaged in seeking other funding sources for your work. We recognize the difficulty of this in all areas of scholarly endeavor, yet no effort leads to no possible additional funding.

G.    The upcoming drop-in schedule is below. Note the meeting next Friday. These meetings, which Assistant Vice Chancellor Michael Jensen and I attend, give you a voice in how this office moves ahead. Try to attend one of these sessions if you possibly can. Generally, five to ten people attend. If an individual meeting better suits you, just let me or Michael know if you want to meet individually with one of us.

 Sessions all are at noon in Suite 300 of the Lawrence Street Center.

 Friday              August 22

Monday           September 15

Tuesday           October 21

Wednesday      November 19

Wednesday      December 17

Friday              January 16

The sessions that have taken place already have: 1) allowed faculty to learn what services and expertise ORS brings to the proposal process, 2) generated informative conversations on what is needed to support scholarly activities on the Denver Campus, and (3) given attendees a forum for letting us know better what your needs are.

 I. There are two items related to Auraria Library (AL) services that you may want to consider. One is a video clip from the ORDE seminar co-presented by Lorrie Evans from the AL called “Navigating Literature and Funding Landscapes” (http://vimeopro.com/user22715452/navigating-literature-and-funding-landscapes). The other is from an ORDE blog on integrating literature and funding searches, which highlights the AL (http://orde-cu.blogspot.com/2014/07/integrating-literature-funding-searches.html).

 J. The Office of Research Development and Education (ORDE) has completely reorganized their website to help you better find many items of importance and interest to you (see below).

 K. The several URL’s below contain information that may be helpful to you:

Info on Drop-in Meetings and funding possibilities at our website at: http://www.ucdenver.edu/ors

 Office of Research Development and Education (ORDE) Website: http://www.ucdenver.edu/academics/research/AboutUs/ORDE/Pages/orde.aspx

Thanks,

Bob Damrauer

Special Assistant to the Provost

Associate Vice Chancellor for Research

Professor of Chemistry