Close-up photo showing the hands of researchers using liquid in beakers in a lab setting

Faculty: Internal grant competition for research travel, publication subvention and seed funds

Case Western Reserve University Vice President for Research and Technology Management Suzanne Rivera announces a campuswide internal grant competition to promote research, scholarship and creative endeavors.

Intended to foster the incubation of new ideas and their cultivation for production of knowledge, this program will provide faculty the freedom to address new and expanding areas of research, scholarship, and creative endeavor, and will serve as a catalyst for major breakthroughs.

The CWRU VPR Catalyst Awards will be divided into three funding categories: research travel, publication subvention and seed funds.

Download the request for applications to learn more.

Eligibility

Principal investigators/scholars must hold faculty appointments at CWRU. All full-time CWRU faculty are eligible to apply.

Although there is no limit on the number of proposals a faculty member may submit, only one award will be made to any faculty member in a given cycle.

Application process

Proposals for all three categories are due Friday, March 30.

Proposals and match commitment letters should be submitted as PDF attachments by email to Suzanne Rivera at suzanne.rivera@case.edu no later than 11:59 p.m. Friday, March 30.

Proposals should be no more than three pages in length and must include:

  • Identification of funding category: research travel, publication subvention or seed funds
  • Faculty member name, department, school/college and title/rank;
  • Title of project for which funding is sought
  • Narrative description of proposed activities to be funded, including:
    • Clear explanation of problem/hypothesis/phenomenon/activity
    • Concise description of planned strategy/procedures
    • Compelling rationale for using institutional resources
    • Degree to which activity/product will be novel and/or interdisciplinary
  • Expected outcome of efforts, with a deliverable and timeline (less than 12 months)
  • Detailed budget (faculty time is not an allowable cost for the research travel and publication subvention tracks) with narrative justification for each line item and identification of source of matching funds

In addition, the match commitment letters accompanying the proposals must be signed by the individual responsible for the speedtype (account number) that will be the source of the match (whether a chair, dean or director of a campus entity such as the Baker-Nord Center). It should state clearly that if a catalyst award is made to the faculty member, matching funds equivalent to the award amount will be made available for spending within the 12-month award period.

Review criteria

A selection committee empaneled by the VPR will review proposals. The following criteria will be considered:

  • The significance of the research problem, scholarship or creative endeavor;
  • The novelty of the proposed project or activity; and
  • The application of interdisciplinary and convergent approaches.