Twenty-eight years have passed since the War on Cancer was initiated,
and during this period the disparities in cancer incidence and mortality
in underserved ethnic minorities have continued to rise. The CMBB
is exploring a potentially powerful approach for addressing this
difficult issue by offering funding and support to create collaborations
and partnerships between Minority-Serving Institutions
(MSIs) and NCI-designated Cancer Centers
to take maximum advantage of their respective expertise and experience.
MSIs conduct high quality programs for educating ethnic minorities
and they represent a rich source of talent with appropriate cultural
sensitivity and perspectives needed in cancer research. However,
MSIs have had difficulties developing and sustaining independent
programs in cancer research, and there is a paucity of minority
scientists who are pursuing successful cancer research careers.
The NCI-designated Cancer Centers are geographically dispersed research-intensive
institutions and are the only organized units supported by the NCI
that conduct research, sponsor research training and career development
in the basic, clinical and population sciences, provide information
services, and develop and sustain educational and outreach programs
that benefit their communities. Yet, the progress of cancer centers
in focusing on research issues of particular importance to cancer
in minorities, in training minority scientists, in reaching out
to and partnering with different minority populations in their communities,
and in bringing the benefits of cancer research to these populations
has been slow and often disappointing.
Through planning activities dedicated to developing stable, long-term
comprehensive partnerships that are mutually beneficial to MSIs and NCI
Cancer Centers, the objectives of the Minority Institution/ Cancer Center
Partnership (MI/CCP) program are to increase the participation of MSIs
in the nation's cancer research and research training enterprise, to
increase the involvement and effectiveness of the Cancer Centers in
research and research training and career development related to
minorities, and to develop more effective research, education and
outreach programs that will have an impact on minority populations.
Unlike the existing platforms used for creating partnerships between
MSIs and research intensive institutions, this concept is based on the
idea of a "True Partnership" where both profit and gain mutual benefits.
Furthermore, this concept is based on long-term infrastructure support and
the requirement of limited projects/program support in order to generate
"traditional" NIH/NCI peer-reviewed grant applications and funding for
minority scientists and projects/programs that focus on cancers which
disproportionately affect minority populations.
The MI/CCP emphasizes fours target areas: 1) Cancer RESEARCH, where
joint pilot research projects may be in any area of basic, clinical,
prevention, control, behavioral, or population research. However, research
projects conducted primarily at the MSI may be in any area of cancer research,
but research projects conducted primarily at the NCI Cancer Center must
specifically address areas of cancer disparity in minority populations; 2)
Cancer RESEARCH TRAINING AND CAREER DEVELOPMENT, where cancer research
training and career development programs can be in any of the research areas
above but must focus on joint programs between MSI and Cancer Center(s) that
place an emphasis on the training of minority scientists and majority trainees
to appreciate the issues and problems associated with cancer incidence and
mortality disparities in minority populations; 3) Cancer EDUCATION, where
cancer education programs could focus on any effort to augment existing or
create new curricula in the MSI and/or the Cancer Center that would apprise
and culturally sensitize graduate and postdoctoral students in research,
medicine and public health of the need to reduce disproportionate cancer
incidence and mortality in racial and ethnic minority populations; and 4)
Cancer OUTREACH, where outreach programs may be defined as proactive efforts
to help minority communities develop and manage their own culturally sensitive
programs for educating their populations about cancer risk, early detection,
screening, prevention, and treatment.
Other unique features of this linkage of research intensive institutions with
Minority-Serving Institutions are that there is an opportunity for ALL Minority
Institutions to participate, not just the "big five MSIs associated with medical
schools, and that each partner is equal and is required to submit separate applications.
Furthermore, these initiatives utilize the Cooperative Agreement mechanism that allows
substantial programmatic involvement to not only provide appropriate evaluation and
advice but also to insure the success of the collaborations and partnerships.
An institution (whether an MSI or CC) is limited to participating in no more than
TWO applications and if participating in two, each application must be aligned with
a different collaborator/partner. There must be commitment from the leadership,
common planning, priority setting, and evaluation shared between the partners; and
all projects and programs must have co-leadership.
The MI/CCP program has three mechanisms of support. Please click on the titles
below to determine which mechanism is appropriate for your funding needs:
Planning Grant for Minority-Institution/
Cancer Center Collaborations (P20)
Cooperative Planning Grant
for Comprehensive Minority Institution/ Cancer Center Partnership
(U56)
Comprehensive Minority
Institution/Cancer Center Partnership (U54)
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