Faculty Grant Program

In Fall 2022, five projects were selected for funding as part of the Undergraduate Research Faculty grant program aimed at facilitating the development or support of novel programs to scale and increase access to undergraduate research for Virginia Tech students. Grantees were selected based on the programs' anticipated impact to significantly scale or increase access to authentic research experiences and program sustainability:

• Siobhan M. Craige, Ph.D. and Adele Addington, Ph.D. (HNFE)- $10,000 to establish a summer training and preparation program in basic science research and create a student-led training paradigm to scale up undergraduate research lab experience.
• Andrew Ellis, Ph.D.; Craig Ramseyer, Ph.D.; Stephanie Zick, Ph.D.; David Carroll, Ph.D.; and Robert Oliver, Ph.D. (Geography)- $10,000 to integrate meteorology undergraduate researchers with practitioners through the Virginia Atmospheric Science Exchange (VASE).
• Dr. Andre Muelenaer, Jr, MD, MS; Penelope A Muelenaer, MD, MPH; Eli Vlaisavljevich, Ph.D.; John Robertson, VMD,  Ph.D.; Anne Staples, Ph.D. (BEAM)- $10,000 to support students to conduct transdisciplinary research in collaboration with their peers at Malawi University of Science and Technology (MUST).
• Jennifer Rainville, Ph.D.; Aparna Shah, Ph.D.; and Kristin Phillips, Ph.D. (School of Neuroscience)- $10,000 to create a lab skills certificate program that will include a repository of training materials and videos which complement hands-on training and practice of specific neuroscience lab techniques.
• Hannah Sunderman, Ph.D.; Donna Westfall-Rudd, Ph.D.; and Tiffany Drape, Ph.D. (ALCE)- $9,977 to increasing access to undergraduate research in agricultural, leadership, and community education through curricular and co-curricular opportunities.

The operational period for the grants is January 2023 through June 2023.

In Fall 2021, six projects were selected for funding as part of the Undergraduate Research Faculty grant program aimed at facilitating the development or support of novel programs to scale and increase access to undergraduate research for VT students. Grantees were selected based on the programs' anticipated impact to significantly scale or increase access to authentic research experiences and program sustainability:

• Benjamin Chambers, Ph.D. (Engineering Education)- $9,607 to developing a program for early academic career research opportunities in engineering using Minecraft. Dr. Chambers received special mention during the last grant cycle.
  
• Natalie Ferand, Ph.D. (School of Education)- $7,317 to provide foundational undergraduate research opportunities for students in Career ad Technical Education in conjunction with the Department of Agricultural, Leadership, and Community Education.
• Kevin Hamed, Ph.D. (Fish and Wildlife Conservation) and Robert Bush, Ph.D. (Sustainable Biomaterials)- $7,337 to engage more than 30 students majoring in Wildlife Conservation and Packaging Systems & Design in a collaborative research project to design bottle modifications that would allow shrews in the wild to escape safely.
• Najla Mouchrek, Ph.D. (Honors College), Nathan Todd King & Emily Jean Vollmer (VT Office of Sustainability)- $5,570 to support the development of the Honors Culture of Sustainability Lab, a campus living laboratory and a space for Honors undergraduate students to engage in interdisciplinary research exploring cultural and social aspects of sustainability, which will be designed as a course-based undergraduate research experience.
• Frederick Paige, Ph.D. (Civil and Environmental Engineering) and Craig Arthur (University Libraries)- $10,000 for their project entitled “Engaged Scholar Training: Sustaining a Culture of Research in Service of Communities”, to scale up research training materials to be accessible to a broader audience.
• Andy Schaudt, MBA (VTTI; Management)- $10,000 to pilot a new program that will allow undergraduate students from the Pamplin College of Business to apply the skills learned in business management coursework to VTTI research projects.

The operational period for the grants is November 2021 through June 2022.

In Spring 2021, five projects were funded as part of a scaled down Undergraduate Research Faculty grant program specifically aimed at facilitating the development or support of novel programs to scale undergraduate research for VT students through virtual/remote means. Grantees were selected based on the programs' anticipated scaling of and access to authentic research experiences, program sustainability, and the incorporation of remote or virtual research methods or modality:

• Pablo Sobrado, Ph.D. (Biochemistry) - $3,500 to pilot a new program entitled "Enzyme Engineering" to train students in several aspects of protein engineering and working as part of a research group.
• Rosanna Breaux, Ph.D., Thomas Ollendick, Ph.D., and Tyler McFayden, Ph.D. (Psychology) - $3,300 to support the project entitled " Training the Next Generation: An Undergraduate Research Opportunity for Future Clinicians", to develope training videos and scoring syntax to support undergraduate students completing research training to conduct behavioral observation coding and obtain research reliability for a commonly used diagnostic interview.
• Gillian Eastwood, Ph.D. and Alexandra Cumbie, Ph.D. (Entomology) - $3,500 to pilot a remote research project entitled "Spring Tick Species Diversity and Prevalence", in which undergraduates engage in fieldwork to collect specimens in their local area, submit ticks to the lab for pathogen testing, shadow lab techniques virtually and conduct data analysis.
• Christopher Arena, Ph.D. and Andre Muelenaer, MD (Biomedical Engineering and Mechanics) - $3,500 to establish a collaboration between Biomedical Engineering and Mechanics (BEAM) at Virginia Tech and Carilion Innovations - Carilion Clinic’s hub for discoveries targeted at improving patient care. Engineering students would work alongside healthcare professionals to support the development of new technologies in the early stages of conceptualization. Project title: "Virginia Tech - Carilion Innovation Internship".
• Andrew Lowell, Ph.D. (Chemistry) and Anne M. Brown, Ph.D. (Biochemistry) - $3,500 to increase undergraduate research opportunities through collaboration between in-person and remote/virtual research teams. By establishing options for computational researchers to gain wet lab experience and vice-versa in the life and physical sciences, we can strengthen interdisciplinary training and enhance opportunities for the next generation of researchers. Project title: "Integrating Computational and Wet-Lab Research Techniques into a Comprehensive, Flexible Research Training Environment."

Special mention

• Cindy Smith, Ph.D. (Human Development): "Understanding parent-child interaction through virtual data collection and remote coding"
• Benjamin Chambers, Ph.D. (Engineering Education): "Developing a program for early academic career research opportunities in engineering using Minecraft"

The operational period for the grants was April through June, 2021

In Spring 2020, seven projects were funded as part of the Undergraduate Research Faculty Grant Program based on programs' anticipated scaling of and access to authentic research experiences as well as program sustainability:

• James Jewitt, SOVA- $6,700 to support student research in Washington D.C. for capstone projects in the Pathways Visual Arts Minor.
• John P Gannon II, FREC- $10,000 to create a stream monitoring station in partnership with the town of Blacksburg to facilitate independent and course-based undergraduate research experiences.
• Debby Good and Angela Anderson, HNFE- $4225 to further develop a CURE in Genotype/Phenotype Analysis with students in Metabolic Nutrition, potentially exposing 750 HNFE undergraduates to authentic research projects and results/data.
• Kereshmeh Afsari, Myers-Lawson School of Construction- $10,000 to establish student access to undergraduate research opportunities in construction robotics.
• E. Scott Geller, Psychology- $9,981 to develop, deliver and evaluate a new interdependent Course-embedded Undergraduate Research Experience in applied behavioral science (ABS) and positive psychology by student-led research projects examining situational determinants of gratitude expression and assessing its influence on subjective well-being (SWB).
• John Chermak, Geosciences- $9,500 to redesign and pilot a traditionally lecture-based Environmental Geosciences course to include a data compilation, collection, and interpretation research project which will allow the diverse student base to get access to an undergraduate research experience.
• Alan Michaels, Hume Center- $10,000 to expand /bridge the Center's research offerings to include non-STEM students in multi-disciplinary teams working on a project involving Use and Abuse of Personal Information.

The operational period for the grants was January through June, 2020.