The Office of the Vice President for Research is pleased to host the NSF workshop: Preparing the NSF Faculty Early Career Award Application, presented by Dr. John Robertson of Grant Writers’ Seminars and Workshops. This virtual workshop will be presented on Wednesday, February 3rd, 2022.

IMPORTANT PRE-REQUISITE: this workshop requires that you attend the NSF-intensive grant writing workshop Planning & Writing Successful NSF Grant Proposals on February 1st & 2nd, 2022. However, if you attended the November 10th-11th, 2020 virtual grant writing workshop presented by Dr. Robertson, the prerequisite is met. When you register, please indicate how you meet the prerequisite.

This workshop is ONLY open to WSU faculty. Eligibility for an NSF Early Career Award includes that you:

• Hold a doctoral degree in a field supported by NSF, and
• Be engaged in research in an area of science, engineering or education supported by NSF, and
• Hold at least a 50% tenure-track position as an assistant professor (or equivalent), and
• Be untenured, and
• Have not previously received a Career Award from NSF

Since the OVPR is covering the costs for the seminar, you must be nominated by your department chair. Provide the name and email of your chairperson at the time of registration for verification.

To register, click on the RSVP button above and complete your registration using your WSU email address or AccessID – and make sure it is correct! You will be sent a link to the webinar approximately 24 hours prior to the event.

Registration will close January 26th (no exceptions). For wait-listing, email Ms. Serowik

Content of the Webinars

Grant Writers’ Seminars & Workshops was founded by academicians for academicians to help researchers obtain formal training in how to support their work with grant proposal writing.

This half-day seminar is a follow-up to the full day Planning & Writing Successful NSF Grant Proposals program and focuses on preparing the NSF CAREER Award application. Meriting a National Science Foundation CAREER Award is a very distinguished milestone in the development of an assistant professor’s academic career. Many apply for the Award – most without success. In our opinion, such failures are usually due to the applicant failing to meet NSF’s purpose for the program, which is to create a teacher-scholar – a faculty member who will use his/her research to attract and motivate students to learn better. Although the competition would at first appear intense (low level of success, compared to the total number of applications submitted), when all of the applications that do not meet the purpose of the program are set aside, the actual rate of success is much higher. Accordingly, this seminar focuses on how to package and present what the applicant wants to do in the context of what NSF wants to support. Included, among other things, are tips and advice regarding: (i) when to apply in order to maximize competitiveness; (ii) using the review process for CAREER Awards to inform writing of the application; (iii) how to choose an educational project that is complementary to and integrated with the applicant’s research proposal; (iv) maximizing the positive impact of the educational outcomes; (v) how to craft a plan for the educational component that includes both formative and summative evaluation; (vi) how to use the Title, Biographical Sketch, and Budget to reflect commitment to becoming a teacher-scholar; (vii) how to maximize the effectiveness of the required departmental letter; and (viii) how to optimize the Broader Impacts part of a CAREER application.

Supporting Material

All participants will receive a copy of the NSF version of The Grant Application Writer's Workbook. Arrangements for pick-up or delivery of the workbook will be organized at a later date.

Dr. John Robertson holds a Doctorate in Pharmacology/Toxicology and has been an Associate Member at Grant Writers’ Seminars & Workshops since 2010. In 2017 he became the Managing Member. He has been the recipient of competitive extramural funding from both the NIH and non-federal sources. He has authored 30 peer-reviewed journal articles and three book chapters. In addition, he has been a member of grant review panels, a reviewer for a number of biomedical journals, and served on editorial boards. He has also been routinely recognized for excellence in teaching.

For more information about this event, please contact Mary Serowik at mserowik@wayne.edu.