Nov. 8, 2021 — CSU Channel Islands (CSUCI) social scientists will soon take part in a multi-campus grant writing program aimed at increasing social science research opportunities for Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSI)s.
The program is funded by a new National Science Foundation (NSF) “Build and Broaden 2.0” grant, which was awarded to researchers from three campuses working together: CSUCI, University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB) and University of California, Irvine (UCI). The grant totals $796,858 with $260,740 awarded directly to CSUCI.
The grant will expand access to external funding opportunities in social sciences for the CSU and UC campuses, with a focus on HSIs.
The researchers have established the California Alliance for Hispanic-Serving Social Science Advancement (CAHSSA). Among its work, CAHSSA will sponsor numerous workshops and seminars designed to help faculty members increase the number of grant awards they receive, which will in turn increase the amount of research they will be able to conduct.
“This grant and the creation of the CAHSSA is important because it shines a spotlight on the social sciences that are sometimes overshadowed by STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) research funding activity,” said CSU Chancellor’s Office Director of Research Opportunities Leslie Ponciano, Ph.D., a co-principal investigator on the grant.
CSUCI Health Sciences and Sociology professor Billy Wagner, MPH, Ph.D., who also serves as Executive Director of the CSU system’s Social Science and Research Instructional Council (SSRIC), is the principal investigator on the grant at CSUCI.
“This is especially important for CSU faculty,” Wagner explained “because in the CSU, faculty teach more classes and have fewer resources to pursue research than faculty at research universities. In addition to other barriers, this makes it even more difficult for CSU faculty to be competitive for grant funding. Our research is aimed at better understanding and mitigating the barriers that faculty experience in pursuing grant funding for research.”
Leading the project is UCSB Director of Research and Development, Barbara Endemaño Walker—also special assistant to the executive vice chancellor, and Belinda Robnett, vice chancellor for diversity, equity, and inclusion. Also involved in the program are co-leads from UCI and the CSU Chancellor’s Office.
“Social science participation in extramurally funded research is historically low at minority-serving institutions,” said Endemaño Walker. “This project will help HSIs and NSF understand the various barriers that prevent faculty at minority-serving institutions (MSIs) from developing robust extramural funding portfolios.”
The first step will be to survey the roughly 4,500 social sciences faculty members across 28 minority-serving public universities in California to determine barriers that may exist for them when they write and submit grant proposals.
Endemaño Walker said these barriers could be lack of incentives for research when it concerns tenure or promotions, inadequate research support or biases that may exist among those who review the grant proposals.
“We want to find out what those barriers are and how to mitigate them so they are more likely to pursue external funding,” Wagner said. “The barriers could be equipment, personnel or it could be time as we teach a lot of classes.”
Training opportunities will include grant proposal writing seminars; writing groups; writing retreats and social science seminars, among other offerings.
Funding for this work began in October and will continue through September 2024.