The project is supporting two workshops intended to help engineering and computer science faculty at minority serving institutions (MSIs) develop proposal writing skills so that they can compete more effectively for support from NSF programs. For the first workshop, which will be presented at an introductory level, the deans at selected MSIs are being asked to nominate up to three faculty members and the 55 participants are being selected from these nominations based on an application outlining a planned proposal. The two-day workshop will discuss proposal writing strategies and how to deal with broader impact and project evaluation. For the second workshop, which will be presented at an advanced level, the project team is inviting those who attended last year's introductory workshop or submitted an unsuccessful CCLI proposal to apply. The 45 participants are being selected based on the description of a proposed project in the application. The two-day workshop is presenting material on writing effective and convincing goals, expected outcomes, rationale, and implementation, dissemination, and evaluation plans. The project is based on prior successful efforts and it is being evaluated by monitoring the participants' proposal writing activity after the workshop.
NSF offers approximately millions of dollars in grants annually to colleges and universities nationwide. The U.S. minority serving institutions (MSIs) with accredited engineering and computer science programs, including the Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs), the Hispanic Serving Institutions (HSIs), the American Indian Serving Engineering Institutions (AISEIs) and Tribal Colleges and Universities, encourage their engineering faculty to compete for grant research programs through the solicitation process promulgated by the National Science Foundation (NSF). Institutions with an abundance of research experience, funding and writing resources are able to win a number of grants while U.S. minority serving institutions that lack resources are not able to provide adequate levels of training to faculty on the art of proposal writing. As a result, these institutions are unsuccessful in the competition for NSF grants. In an effort to write more competitive proposals for NSF grants, two (2) NSF grant writing sponsored workshops were held for faculty from accredited engineering and computer science programs at minority serving institutions (MSIs) in Arlington, Virginia. The first workshop was conducted on February 22-23, 2010 and the second workshop was conducted on March 15-16, 2010. The grant writing workshop training provided the skills that are not typically available to faculty from accredited engineering and computer science programs at minority serving institutions and created more opportunities through interaction with NSF program directors to submit competitive and collaborative proposals. This project actively recruited 80 faculty members from accredited engineering and computer science programs at minority serving colleges and universities. The participants completed two surveys to assess the workshops: 1) one survey immediately after the workshops and 2) a follow-up survey six months later. Each group answered a series of questions related to grant writing opportunities and funding opportunities. Additionally, each group provided feedback on strategies to improve the quality and quantity of proposals submitted to NSF and on enhancing future workshops. Approximately, eighty percent of the participants were overall very satisfied with both workshops. They were able to meet with DUE program director to discuss strategies for enhancing the quality of their proposal submissions. Based on the follow-up survey six months after the completion of the workshops, the participants were able to improve the quality and to increase the quantity of proposals resubmitted. Approximately thirty five percent of the grants submitted after the workshops have been successfully funded through notification. This interaction with NSF Program Directors led to an increase in the number of proposals submitted, in the number of collaborative proposals among the participating institutions, and in success rates. In addition, the number of participants from accredited engineering and computer science programs at minority serving colleges and universities in the review process of NSF proposals were increased. Most of the participants have shared their knowledge and insights on proposal writing with colleagues on their campus.
