Collaborative Research: RD/RA Support Networks at Diversified Research Institutions (SUNDRI)

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Principal investigators at diverse research institutions, which includes emerging and primarily undergraduate institutions, often face challenges in seeking external funding, producing competitive research proposals, and managing awards. The project’s aim is to sharpen understanding of the unique aspects of currently less research-intensive institutions and how funding agencies and intermediaries can best support them to flourish and grow their research contributions. Current knowledge is based on relatively small numbers of case studies and anecdotes; more systematic data are needed. This project will survey research development and administration staff at a national random sample of roughly one in four not-for-profit four-year colleges and universities and use the results to develop strengths-based and deficit-based modeling of needs, capacities, and opportunities for growth, providing clear and concrete expression of their perspectives, challenges, and requirements. The resulting findings, conclusions, and baseline data for further studies will provide valuable new knowledge and enhance national networks of expertise, communication, and service to diverse research institutions. An institutionally distributed set of research development/research administration (RD/RA)-knowledgeable investigators and expert advisors in higher education capacity-building will collaborate to build a comprehensive picture of how RD/RA functions are distributed and performed at four-year colleges and universities. The PI/coPIs and technical staff will first develop and refine a survey instrument based on prior surveys and a series of site visits, advisory consultations, and focus groups, testing and piloting measures to determine how and how well RD/RA activity is currently conducted and assessing needs and resources for enhancement. The project will seed the survey instrument and associated analytic files with data harvested from IES and NCSES institutional censuses such as IPEDS and HERD. An eight-stratum random sample of baccalaureate, masters, and doctoral institutions will be drawn from the IPEDS universe, with oversamples of selected subsets such as HBCUs, with a target completion rate of 70%+ and target N=500+. Measures will assess variations in depth, resource levels, and interpenetration of distinctive RD and RA functions, strengths and weaknesses of the RD effort; and perceived needs and priorities for internal and networked support to enhance RD/RA quality and capacity. Statistical analyses will probe unique and common aspects of the research support enterprise and results will be broadly disseminated.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.