PREP Program
The Institute for Society, Culture, and Environment is offering the Preparing your Research for an Extramural Proposal program for a cohort of faculty members in the social sciences who are planning to submit a research grant proposal to a federal agency (e.g., NIH, NSF, NEH) for funding in the next year. The program is intended for faculty who are relatively new to the proposal writing process, or whose prior proposals for which they have served as PI or a co-investigator have not been funded, but who are actively pursuing an externally funded research agenda.
Overview
This two-semester, structured program consists of didactic and interactive sessions where cohort members learn (a) the grantsmanship process, including how to write a compelling narrative and develop a budget; and (b) to craft a competitive grant proposal.
Anticipated fall activities include:
- Mandatory 1 to 2 in-person sessions per month to learn grant writing basics and review funding agency requirements; and
- Development of a compelling 1 to 2-page concept paper that presents the project idea for communicating with a program officer.
Spring semester activities include:
- Mandatory, in-person monthly sessions of approximately 2-3 hours each that will consist of writing, reviewing, critiquing, and discussing cohort member proposals; and
- Development of a complete draft of a proposal to be refined and submitted by August 2025 (or soon thereafter, dependent on agency deadline).
Cohort members are required to spend time outside of sessions on tailored assignments (fall) and preparing their proposals and brief written reviews of their peers' proposals (spring). The ISCE leadership team will provide group and tailored mentoring throughout the year.
Questions
Contact Yancey Crawford (yanceyc3@vt.edu)
ISCE PREP Cohorts
Click on the tabs below to view the recipients and project titles of the current and past ISCE PREP cohorts.
- Austin Gray, assistant professor of Biological Sciences in the College of Science, "Assessing the Occurrence and Impact of CECs in Floodwaters in Disadvantaged Communities in Hampton Roads: An Ecological and Environmental Justice Approach"
- Isabel Prochner, assistant professor of Industrial Design in the College of Architecture, Arts & Design, "Design-driven methods and technologies enabling more effective, safe, and comfortable chest binding for transgender people"
- Rosanna Breaux, assistant professor of Psychology in the College of Science, "Validation of the Parent Emotion Socialization in Daily Life Measure"
- Zehra Gulseven, assistant professor of Psychology in the College of Science, "Examining Prosocial Development from Middle Childhood through Adolescence"
- Zhenshan Chen, assistant professor of Agricultural and Applied Economics in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, "Fair and Viable Carbon Markets for Farmers: Empowering Sustainable Agriculture Practitioners"
To read the VT News article, click here.
- Sweta Baniya, assistant professor of English in the College of Liberal Arts and Human Sciences, “Compounding Crisis and Communication: Strengthening Transnational Disaster Response and Community Resilience via Social Justice Oriented Crisis Communication”
- Rachel Cheng, assistant professor of food science and technology in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, “Case-control Study of Foodborne and Non-Foodborne Acquired Salmonellosis in Children”
- Shaddi Hasan, assistant professor of computer science in the College of Engineering, “Advancing Digital Equity through Scalable Techniques for Improving Broadband Data Collection and Integrity”
- Rachelle Kuehl, research scientist for the Center for Rural Education, “Teaching Race in Rural Places: Investigating Contextualized Challenges, Successes, and Solutions in Contentious Times”
- Jessica Rich, research assistant professor for the Center for Coastal Studies, “A Comparative Study of Environmental Decision-Making in Coastal Virginia and Greenland”
- Ruichuan Zhang, assistant professor for the Myers-Lawson School of Construction in the College of Engineering, “Assessing Adaptive Buildings for Inclusive Disaster Response”
To read the VT News article, click here.
- Elinor Benami, assistant professor of agricultural and applied economics in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, “Reassessing drought indicators used to finance relief payments in the U. S. Crop Insurance Program.”
- Heather Davis, assistant professor of psychology in the College of Science, “Investigating shame as a mechanism underlying eating disorder comorbidity.”
- Junghwan Kim, assistant professor of geography in the College of Natural Resources and Environment, “Assessing urban walkability with an artificial intelligence (AI) method: A case study in small-sized U.S. cities.”
- Karin Kitchens, assistant professor of political science in the College of Liberal Arts and Human Science, “Identifying variation in juvenile sentencing.”
- Michael G. Sorice, associate professor of forest resources and environmental conservation in the College of Natural Resources and Environment, “Ecosystem stewardship as a policy target: Cultural expectations for private lands in the United States.”
- Hannah M. Sunderman, assistant professor of agricultural, leadership, and community education in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, “An intersectional approach to leader(ship) identity development through meaning making.”
- Clara H. Suong, assistant professor of political science in the College of Liberal Arts and Human Science, “Popular but unimportant? Power and language in digital diplomacy.”
To read the VT News article, click here.