University Research Council

October 14, 2004

Meeting Summary

FUTURE ACTIVITES

The Provost will deliver the Council’s charge on November 5.  He will ask the Council to continue to work with the Office of Research on the small grants program and on the Office’s electronic research administration procedures.  He also will ask the Council to explore opportunities for several research and grant initiatives, an interdisciplinary small grant program, and an ongoing speaker series.

SUBCOMMITTEES

Members of the Council were assigned to subcommittees on electronic research administration, interdisciplinary small grants, support for the humanities, and research publicity.  The Council’s subcommittees are comprised of the following individuals:

Electronic Research Administration

Rory A. Cooper

 

Janice S. Dorman

 

Patricia W. Dowling

 

Meryl Karol

 

Michael Lewis

 

Irving J. Lowe

 

Daniel Shaw

 

 

Interdisciplinary Small Grants

Gene W. Gruver

 

Mike Lovell

 

Mike Madison

 

Pei Tang

 

Raman Venkataramanan

 

Craig Wilcox

 

 

Research Publicity

John D. Beuthin

 

Michael Cascio

 

Patrick Loughlin

 

Guillermo G. Romero

 

Robert J. Weyant

 

 

Support for the Humanities

Esther Gal-Or

 

Janelle Greenberg

 

Steve Husted

 

John Mendeloff

REPORT FROM THE OFFICE OF RESEARCH

Mike Crouch, Director of the Office of Research, discussed proposal processing within the Office.  The Office processes an average of 450 proposals per month, but this number can reach 600 per month during January, May, and September.  The National Institutes of Health are the source of 50 percent of the University’s research funds.  NIH proposals are generally due in the aforementioned months.

The Office hired an Assistant Director for Education and Training to develop a research administration certificate program.  Few universities employ someone to educate and train staff in research administration.  The Office of Research will benchmark the development of its program against the programs of the few universities that do employ such individuals.  A fully developed program should exist within three years.

CONFERENCES AND SPEAKERS

Upcoming conferences and speaking engagements include:

  • Julie Norris, formerly of MIT, will visit the University on November 16.  She will discuss A21 regulations. 
  • The University will host a humanities conference from November 11-13.  The conference will highlight the definition of the “Era”.
  • The University will sponsor a celebration of the discovery of the Salk Vaccine.  The event will take place next April.
  • The Center for National Preparedness will host a conference on October 20 and 21.  Conference participants will discuss national preparedness issues.

MISCELLANEOUS

Several other issues were discussed:

  • The University is a member of a consortium that will run the National Energy Technology Lab.  Other academic members include CMU and WVU.
  • The Provost’s Office will sponsor the annual federal trip to Washington, D.C.  Faculty from the social sciences, the humanities, and education will participate in the trip.
  • The Association for the Assessment and Accreditation of Laboratory Animal Care will visit the University in November.
  • The Health Science schools established ARTHUR (Application Repository To Help University Researchers), a database of successful grant applications.
  • The University published a 12-article booklet that describes research foci at the University.