News Article

Participants from the 28 EPSCoR (Established Program to Stimulate Competitive Research) jurisdictions heard from National Science Foundation staff and shared their successes and concerns at the winter PD/PA/EOD meeting held Jan. 22-23. 

Four iUTAH team leaders – Project Director Michelle Baker, Project Administrator Andy Leidolf, EOD Director Mark Brunson and EOD Coordinator Ellen Burns – attended the meeting held in Honolulu. Ellen spoke about iUTAH’s connections with the Society for Advancement of Chicanos and Native Americans in Science (SACNAS) and the American Indian Science and Engineering Society (AISES) during discussions about diversity enhancement. Mark described results of our EOD Catalyst Grant and Research Catalyst Grant programs as part of a session on EOD highlights.

The meeting featured four sessions: one from EPSCoR’s leadership in Washington, DC, on the latest policy adjustments to the program; one focusing on project administration; one focused on EOD activities; and one on program evaluation. The latter three were organized by staff from different state jurisdictions and were designed to share positive experiences, ongoing concerns, and best practice in EPSCoR management.

iUTAH is scheduled to make a “reverse site visit” (RSV) to NSF headquarters in September as part of our program’s ongoing evaluation, and we were pleased to learn about changes in the RSV process that will afford us more time to describe our program. We also heard about adjustments to NSF’s program administration arising from a federal effort to make granting processes more consistent across agencies. iUTAH participants can expect to hear more about these developments over the next few months.