2016 – 2017 grant development highlights
The focus areas of the grant development office are to support Signature & Emerging areas, grant resubmissions, junior faculty, high profile grants and UMS collaborations.
These are a few of our most recent successes in each area.
Signature & Emerging Areas
Maine marine economy and jobs bond
Marine Sciences is a UMaine Signature Area of Excellence. Grant development staff assisted a UMS proposal writing team lead by Heather Leslie, Paul Anderson and Jake Ward with the submission of a $7 million bond proposal targeting the Maine Marine Economy.
Signature & Emerging Areas
NIH Center on Biomedical Research Excellence (COBRE)
Aging Research is an emerging area of excellence. The grant development office provided group facilitation, junior faculty support, and overall project management of the $10.5M Successful Aging for Independent Living COBRE grant submission to NIH. This large research center proposal was about a year in the making and will support 4 existing UMaine junior faculty in their pursuit to independent researcher status. Scientific leadership will be provided by Carol Kim as PI, with Len Kaye and Rosemary Smith as Co-PIs, and Dave Neivandt as the engineering core director. We will partner the with EMMC physicians who will augment the junior faculty mentorship with their clinical expertise.
Grant Resubmissions
$1M from USDA to boost Maine organic grain production
The grant development staff worked with Ellen Mallory to assist her with interpreting the review panel’s feedback. He provided guidance on restructuring her narrative and contributed content to her data management plan. Her resubmission was successfully funded.
“We are very excited by this new USDA award in that it recognizes the impact of the work we’ve done with farmers, millers and bakers with our prior grant to build a local, organic bread wheat economy in our region…” -Ellen Mallory
Junior Faculty Support
UMaine researcher recommended for prestigious NSF CAREER award
The grant development office worked with Aaron Putnam in the Climate Change Institute on his NSF CAREER proposal resubmission. We provided feedback on his overall narrative, from the perspective of non-content experts, and helped him with developing a timeline in table format that allowed him to fit within the 15 page limit. Read more about the award.
This work provides an international cross-cultural platform for immersing the next generation of scientists, science teachers, and science journalists in the Earth and climate sciences.” – Aaron Putnam
High Profile Grants
UMaine hosts Mandela Washington Fellowship for Young African Leaders
UMaine was selected to host the Mandela Washington Fellowship for Young African Leaders this June – Led by Provost Hecker, VP Kim, Jonathan Rubin, Dan Dixon, and others. This proposal was turned around in 3 weeks and illustrates how the grant development office effectively assists with time sensitive project management on high profile grants. Read more about the 2016 UMaine Mandela Washington Fellowship.
Supporting UMS Collaborations
UMS Research Reinvestment Fund
The UMS Research Reinvestment Fund provides competitive/seed grant funding to UMS researcher and infrastructure support to the Research Enterprise. Seed grants provide funding to UMS research teams for research, development and commercialization projects that will impact the Maine economy and attract follow-up funding to leverage the investment. Planing grants are designed to provide support for collaborative teams to form and prepare for a larger initiative.
Read more about the Research Reinvestment fund can be found here.