During the Board of Regents meeting Feb. 5, the Provost’s New Faculty Awards were announced. These awards are meant to encourage a new wave of research and creativity at Eastern. The Regents approved $145,264 in awards for faculty members to use in their first or second year of employment during the 2017 fiscal year, according to a press release from University Communications. The 31 awards went to new faculty members studying everything from chemistry, to sociology, to economic research.
New faculty members will be able to receive up to $5,000 in awards per year. According to the 2016/17 guidelines for these awards, faculty members who have been hired after the fall of 2014 and were in a "Tenure-track position" by the beginning of this school year were eligible.
"The award is intended to support faculty members in a way that best addresses their needs in initiating their research program at EMU," says the program's guidelines.
"The idea behind these are to get new faculty in the research pipeline, to provide seed money in work that help in applying for future grants," Geoff Larcom, EMU's executive director of Media Relations, said via email.
Recipients of this award may only receive it once during their time at Eastern. This year's recipients include Jamie Cornelius, an associate biology professor.
"I study the behavioral and physiological responses of birds to changes in the environment, with a focus on those changes that are unpredictable and potentially stressful," said Cornelius in an EMU press release on the awards. "This award is crucial for launching my career at EMU and will benefit my students in the coming years as they develop projects using this equipment."
Proposals to spend the award money must include a formal application form, a cover letter, a description of the work that the applicant intends to do, an explanation of how it would benefit the faculty member's research, a budget summary, an endorsement letter from their department head, document access and a curriculum vitiate. Applications are reviewed by the University Research and Sabbatical Leave Committee.
Applications should be submitted to the associate provost and VP of graduate studies and research in graduate school by November 16th. The full application guidelines can be found at emich.edu/research. A full list of award recipients and their research projects can be found here.
