NSF 101: GRANTED

By Eleanor Johnson

November 9, 2023

The Growing Research Access for Nationally Transformative Equity and Diversity (GRANTED) initiative differs from other U.S. National Science Foundation programs. Instead of funding scientific research or education, it aims to strengthen an institution's and the nation's research enterprise. The research enterprise includes human capital, practices, processes and partnerships related to:

Research development
Research administration
Broader impacts activities
Technology transfer and commercialization
Corporate relations/public-private partnerships
Research integrity
Compliance and security
Research policy
Support of student research training
Research leadership

Many R1 and R2 institutions — doctoral institutions with very high or high research activity — often have strong research enterprises available to aid their researchers. However, other institutions without as many resources, or institutions that are more focused on education, do not have the same opportunities available for researchers on their campuses. GRANTED awards are geared towards lessening that gap by providing funding to help improve the research enterprise.

GRANTED's goal is to strengthen the nation's research enterprise and make gains with emerging research and minority-serving institutions. This program is looking for bold, ambitious ideas that will increase access, catalyze national transformation, and address systematic equity and diversity issues in the research enterprise.

Potential ideas for GRANTED include, but are not limit to:

Workforce development of research enterprise staff and functions
Hiring research enterprise staff
Researching the research enterprise
Evaluating existing programs and scaling effective training programs
Researching the sustainability of programs that have significant funding
Transferrable ways to improve post-award project and program management
Research leadership development
Knowledge management and sharing systems for research enterprise content

Any ideas should be fully developed and fit into the project description funding opportunity. Current funding opportunities can be found on the GRANTED webpage; current GRANTED awards may be found using the NSF award search. GRANTED proposals do not have a funding limit in order to encourage potential awardees to request the funding needed to successfully complete a project. There are no limits to the number of submissions or deadlines for this funding opportunity. Any institution that is eligible for NSF funding can apply for a GRANTED award.

One of the first recipients of the program, STaR Division: Science, Technology and Research of the West Virginia High Education Policy Commission, shared what they are putting their award towards. "The grant will be used to form a network of faculty and grant administrators who can help identify and address the barriers to grant submission and administration at the diverse institutions within the state. We hope to be able to leverage these results to other NSF Established Program to Stimulate Competative Research (EPSCoR) jurisdictions," said Juliana Sera, senior director of STaR and West Virigina program director for NSF's EPSCoR.

For more information about GRANTED, including dates and times of office hours, please check their webpage or email granted@nsf.gov.