BOONE—Appalachian State University has received $33,986 from the University of North Carolina General Administration to implement a program to help faculty hone their grant-writing skills.

The funding is part of President Erskine Bowles’ plans to expand research capacity across the UNC system, including faculty participation in externally funded research and scholarly activities.

“This grant will help facilitate our ongoing efforts in faculty development by assisting the faculty in their efforts to identify and generate funds to support their research,” said Provost and Executive Vice Chancellor Stan Aeschleman.

Last year, Appalachian received $11.3 million in grants and other external funding to support faculty research, service and outreach. While this total represents a 24 percent increase in funding from the 2004-05 academic year, only 20 percent of Appalachian’s faculty submitted grant proposals for funding research and other projects.

“Grant writing is not a skill that is taught in doctoral programs, unless you are in the sciences,” explained Edelma Huntley, dean of research and graduate studies in the Cratis D. Williams Graduate School.

The UNC system’s “Transforming Campuses” grant augments steps Appalachian implemented in 2005 to bolster faculty research when Pollyanne Frantz was named coordinator of proposal development in the graduate school’s Office of Research and Sponsored Programs.

Frantz helps direct the grant writing process and works with individual faculty and teams of faculty on all facets of the proposal development process, from refining an idea and finding potential collaborators to helping faculty locate funding opportunities.

The UNC General Administration funding builds on these activities in two ways:

It provides funds that will enable seven faculty members currently engaged in sponsored research to receive reassigned time from their normal three-course teaching load. In return, the faculty members will assist with the university’s research education initiatives.

In addition, a series of workshops will be offered to faculty members who have never written grant proposals. The workshop will take faculty members from proposal development to grant writing and submission. An online “toolbox” of information will be developed for faculty to use when preparing grants, which will include sample grant proposals and budgets, and links to federal agencies that award grants. The toolbox will be created with assistance from senior English majors in the Department of English’s professional writing seminar.

“We want to help our faculty understand the process and give them as much support as possible,” Huntley said.

“Faculty need external funding in order to conduct their research, and to engage in various service and outreach projects,” she said. “We want to help develop the grant writing skills of others who are interested.”

At Appalachian, external funds enable the university to operate its GEAR UP Program, which prepares young people to succeed in college, Appalachian Family Innovations, which strengthens families and halts cycles of abuse and neglect, and its Senior Companion and Foster Grandparents programs.

Grants and funds from external sources also develop programs and activities to support the region’s wine industry, fund research on boosting soldiers’ immune systems, help youth with disabilities transition into the working world, and develop an online database of plant life in southeastern United States for use by researchers and others.

###