*REVISED* EPSCoR Research Infrastructure Improvement-Focused EPSCoR Collaborations Program (RII-FEC) NSF 24-573
Sponsor: NSFInternal Deadline: 09/05/2024Institutional Submission Limit: 1Sponsor Deadline: 12/17/2024Program Website
**This entry and theme have been updated**
The RII-FEC program intends to provide a mechanism for interjurisdictional research teams to increase their capacity for conducting use-inspired research, by accepting proposals in the following focus area: "Building capacity towards use-inspired research."
For fiscal year 2025 and 2026 RII-FEC competition, RII-FEC invites proposals that are focused on enabling the opportunity for interjurisdictional teams who have been historically conducting foundational research, to extend their work by pursuing related, use-inspired research questions in any area of science, technology, engineering, or mathematics that NSF supports. This work may focus on developing and positioning the research toward a use-inspired approach; building the partnerships necessary to enable this work; or building institutional and multijurisdictional resources across the network to have the support of such efforts. Successful projects are expected to position teams to be competitive in acquiring further funding for use-inspired research activities.
While submissions must address the focus area: “Building capacity towards use-inspired research”, the scientific disciplinary or topical area for submissions is open. Proposals that address the national key critical and emerging technologies or NSF key technology focus areas are particularly encouraged. Proposed research should be motivated by a societal challenge or national need.
Note: The definition of use-inspired research for this DCL includes any topic that advances research and innovation for breakthrough technologies and solutions to national and societal challenges.
Projects must include researchers from at least two EPSCoR eligible jurisdictions. Additionally, EPSCoR recognizes that the development of early-career faculty from backgrounds that are traditionally underrepresented in STEM fields is critical to sustaining and advancing research capacity. The integration and inclusion of Minority-Serving Institutions (MSIs), women's colleges, Primarily Undergraduate Institutions (PUIs), and two-year colleges is a critical component of this sustainable STEM capacity.
The internal deadline for this competition will be 5 pm on September 5, 2024.
The NSF LOI deadline (required) is December 17, 2024, and the full proposal will be due January 28, 2025.
Submission Process
Limited submissions MUST be coordinated with the Office of the Vice President for Research.
If interested in applying for this opportunity, send the following as a single PDF by the INTERNAL DEADLINE above to Julie Morris at jmorris@sc.edu.
• Project Summary (1 page): Provide an overview, which briefly describes: the vision and goals of the collaboration; a statement of the objectives and methods to be employed; expected impacts of the proposed activities; and plans for sustaining collaborations and impacts beyond the award period.
• Project Description (4 pages): Please describe the motivation and rationale for establishing the collaboration, and how the proposed project addresses the identified research focus area for this competition. Provide a concise description of the long-term research and education goals and intellectual focus and briefly describe the planned activities to enable their scientific merit and broader impacts to be assessed including comment on the novelty and/or originality of the proposed approach. Provide a brief description of planned STEM workforce development activities including training for postdoctoral, graduate, and undergraduate trainees.
• A SCiENcv formatted biosketch for PI and co-PIs