Deadline Nears for New Investigator Development Courses

A course focusing on administrative policies and procedures for submitting a grant and another course helping junior faculty refine competitive research proposal-writing skills are being offered for the first time this fall through the Office of Research at The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston. A faculty advisory committee helped in the program’s initial design.

The program, said Rena D’Souza, D.D.S., Ph.D., “augments the campus-wide infrastructure for biomedical research at a time when the recruitment of outstanding faculty researchers is under way.” D’Souza, who chairs the program’s faculty steering team, is professor of orthodontics at the UT Dental Branch at Houston and a faculty member at the UT Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences at Houston.

The deadline for applying for either course is Friday, Sept. 17.

Grants 101 is a full-day course open to all faculty, staff and trainees, 8 a.m.-5 p.m., Monday, Sept. 27, Medical School Building, Fifth Floor Gallery. The course includes two sections, “Developing Research Grants and Contracts” and “Post Award Management of Research Grants and Contracts.” Registration, limited to the first 50 to sign up, is online.

Grants 102 is an intensive, eight-month workshop. Participants attend seminars on grant development and peer review, and develop a grant application that is ready to submit for external funding when the
workshop ends.

The workshop can accommodate up to 20 participants per year and is open to all full-time health science center faculty members. The faculty steering team will review the applications and select the participants it feels will benefit most from participating.

Preference is given to junior faculty members who have not yet received significant research funding, but are able to demonstrate a long-term commitment and ability to develop an independent research program. Application materials for Grants 102 should be submitted to Melissa.Proll@uth.tmc.edu.

“The two-course program will provide a useful roadmap for research faculty as they develop into independently funded investigators and future mentors,” D’Souza said. The novel program should help place health science center faculty members in a competitive position for major grants in the biomedical research enterprise.

Peter Davies, M.D., Ph.D., executive vice president for research, said he is “delighted with the development of this new program to help our faculty manage the increasingly complex process of applying for research grants and contracts. In this time of increasing competition for federal research dollars, it is important that our university find as many ways as possible to support our faculty, students and staff as they work to build our research programs. These two grants training courses are an excellent addition to our overall programs for the support of research.”

For questions about either course, contact Melissa Proll, Ph.D., director, Research Training and Compliance, Office of Research, (713) 500-3192.

— Pamela Lewis, Public Affairs