Research Development LAUNCH PAD – Learning About, Understanding, and Navigating Competitive Honors and ProposAl Development
LAUNCH PAD is a workshop series focused on helping early career faculty create a strong foundation to compete for external funding and recognition in research, scholarship, and/or creative activities. The series is also appropriate for research scientists, postdoctoral fellows, graduate students, and other faculty who would like to improve their existing skills and knowledge. Attendees will learn about resources, strategy, and skill development across a broad range of proposal development topics. Each session includes a presentation and Q&A with Research Development staff and/or other subject matter experts.
FALL 2023 WORKSHOPS – the first Tuesday of each month 3:30-5 p.m. on ZOOM (unless noted otherwise).
September 5, 2023 – Research Development Open House
Student Union 262 A/B
Learn how Research Development services can help you secure external funding and recognition for your research, scholarship, and/or creative activities. This in-person event provides opportunities to connect one-on-one with staff and learn about insights, partnerships, and resources that give proposals a competitive edge. Registration is encouraged.
September 20, 2023 – Ideation for NSF’s Convergence Accelerator: Get the Early-Bird Advantage BONUS SESSION!
Today’s wicked challenges require convergence: merging innovative ideas, approaches, and technologies from a diverse range of disciplines. The NSF Convergence Accelerator program maximizes convergence and innovation to fast-track basic research into usable solutions. This fall, we expect to be invited to submit new topics for NSF’s next cycle of Convergence Accelerator funding. If you’re even slightly interested, join us to learn more about this unique funding mechanism, identify topics for future solicitations, and potentially form new collaborations.
October 3, 2023 – Finding Competitiveness in Supplementary Documents; NSF SciENcv Updates
Supplementary documents (biographical sketch, current and pending support, data management plan, facilities, etc.) are often an afterthought in the proposal development process, leaving missed opportunities for bolstering a project’s overall competitiveness. Beyond the page-limited technical narrative, supplementary documents offer additional opportunities to strategically influence reviewers and funders. This workshop will discuss how these documents play an important role in supporting the credibility of a proposal and provide tips for holistically crafting more competitive supplementary documents to make your proposal stand out from the rest. Plus, we will review the mandatory NSF transition to SciENcv for personnel documents (it’s not that scary!).
November 7, 2023 – Finding Funding Opportunities
This workshop provides an overview of how to use Pivot and other resources to find the right funding opportunities to support your research, scholarship, and/or creative activity. Attendees will learn how to create a customized Pivot profile tailored to your funding priorities and how to navigate the limited submissions process.
December 5, 2023 – Positioning for Prestigious Fellowships and Awards
In order to succeed in the most prestigious national STEM and social science fellowship competitions, early career faculty should position themselves as especially promising researchers well before the year of application. This workshop will discuss the optimal sequence of very early career research and recognition, and provide an overview of the annual award nomination process at UT.
For questions on workshops or registration, please contact researchdevelopment@utk.edu.