Note: Thank you for your interest in ADVANCE Project TRACS, our NSF funded Institutional Transformational Grant which ended August 31, 2017. The pages that follow are historical documents for informational purposes only.

These resources are now available through the MSU Center for Faculty Excellence. Below are some resources to get you started at your own institution.

Grant Submission Training Coordinator

The retention and advancement of STEM/SBS faculty women is enhanced when they are grant successful. We designated a Grant Submission Training Coordinator to assist with training on submitting proposals for external funding for all faculty, but giving priority to women STEM/SBS faculty. These efforts included training and assistance with:

  • generating high quality grants,
  • budget development,
  • paperwork submission,
  • responding to reviewers,
  • researching unusual circumstances related to possible grant activities, and
  • facilitating interdisciplinary collaborations.

Key activities included running a yearly Grant-Writing Bootcamp (see below), providing one-on-one grant support, and connecting grant-seeking faculty to grant-successful faculty. 

Grant-Writing Bootcamp

Grant-Writing Bootcamp is designed to help grant-interested faculty produce a quality, successful proposal, with valuable information and support from grant-successful facilitators. Participants have the opportunity to interact with grant-successful senior faculty, to work with peer support in writing groups, and to use a team of proposal support personnel who have the submitter's individual needs in mind. A one-year pre-post test of the impact of Bootcamp on women faculty in STEM's research capacity was reported in the peer-reviewed journal Bioscience (Smith et al., 2017). Over the span of one year (and contrasting results with a comparison sample who were not part of the bootcamp) showed women participating in Grant-Writing Bootcamp significantly increased the number of external grants submitted, number of proposals led as PI, number of external grants awarded, and amount of external funding dollars awarded.

Grant Facilitator Network

In the Grant Facilitator Network, grant-seeking faculty connect with a network of grant-successful faculty to assist with submission and revisions of grant applications. Facilitators review grant applications and provide constructive feedback, or share samples of successful grant proposals and abstracts.

Diversification Mini-Grant Award Program

To help enhance faculty scholarship/research, grant proposals are solicited each year from all faculty with priority given to outstanding applications by women in STEM/SBS. The mini-grants can be used to diversify faculty's research or teaching including requesting funds to collect pilot data; collaborating on an interdisciplinary project; developing multi-department research proposals or courses; pairing new faculty with senior faculty across departments; requesting funds for retreats, workshops, or speakers; traveling to other campuses and conferences; and adding a diversity component to existing research and courses.