Vanderbilt Experimental Research Training Inclusion Community Engagement Skills (VERTICES)

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Project Summary In this new application we propose a unique training experience that builds upon Vanderbilt University's (VU) extraordinary record of research, training, and fostering diversity in biomedical science and that seeks to create a new paradigm promoting the pathway to biomedical science careers and aspirational life choices for a cadre of underrepresented, postbaccalaureate scholars. This program provides an intellectually, socially and culturally rewarding experience to engage scholars at multiple levels throughout a 12 month training program. We will leverage VU's training expertise to cultivate knowledge and research skills and provide an integrated training program that supports resilience by fostering connections among program participants and their research mentors, peers, and respective communities. A strong multiple-PI leadership team is composed of senior individuals with overlapping expertise in scientific research, mentoring, inclusion, skill development, trainee engagement, and fostering a community of diverse scholars. This team is supported by internal and external board members with demonstrated commitment to training and diversity. We will provide a research intensive immersion for carefully-selected scholars each year. Our pool of distinguished mentors have a diversity of research interests that are aligned with the mission of NIGMS. In addition to an intense, mentored research experience, we will offer unique perspectives and resources, provide a productive framework to fully understand the promise and process of scientific discovery, and foster invaluable connections among scholars and their mentors and communities. We posit that scholars, most especially those from underrepresented groups, must also be trained in how to relate their work to the larger community. They must be aware and knowledgeable of the forces shaping the public's perception of science and how to shape the scientific narrative in both underrepresented and majority communities. Our overall goal is ambitious and innovative; we seek to create scholars that will become the integrators needed to connect science with communities through their academic credentials, ability to build and retain trust, and cultural competence skills. We will fulfill this vision through: an intensive research and training immersion experience, with mentoring as a central component; regular opportunities to interact with their peers and acquire the core values of collaboration, teamwork and personal enrichment; and exposure to the public awareness of science, education, policy and social change. Together, we will thus provide an exciting and comprehensive experience to minority scholars poised to make career-defining, life- changing decisions with future implications for the scientific enterprise across the nation.