Contact:

Sanya A. Springfield, Ph.D.
Comprehensive Minority Biomedical Branch
Office of Centers, Training and Resources
ODDES, NCI
Telephone: (301) 496-7344
E-mail: ss165i@nih.gov

Objective of Project:
To help researchers and faculty in Minority Serving Institutions (MSIs) in collaboration with the researchers and faculty of NCI-designated Cancer Centers (or other institutions with highly organized, integrated research efforts focused on cancer) plan and initiate focused cancer research, cancer research training and career development or cancer research education collaborations that will lead to the submission of specific grant applications traditionally supported by the National Cancer Institute (NCI). Planning grants must be focused on one or two targeted grant mechanisms that would achieve the following goal(s): (1) to increase the number of individual minority scientists engaged in cancer research through the submission of research grants that are collaborative efforts between individuals at MSIs and Cancer Centers (e.g., R03s, R01s, project on a P01, project on a P50 etc); (2) to implement collaborative training and career development programs between MSIs and Cancer Centers designed to train minority scientists (e.g., T32s, R25Ts, K12s); or (3) to implement collaborative education programs designed to provide minority students and trainees with research experiences that will serve to motivate them to pursue cancer research careers (e.g. R25E).

Description of Project:
Planning Grants for Minority Institution Cancer/Center Collaborations will support the focused collaborative planning activities beneficial to the researchers, faculty, and students of the MSI and Cancer Center. Applicants are expected to develop a formal planning process that would clearly lay out an initial planning stage (in which the participants establish appropriate means of communicating and identifying areas of potential collaborations), a priority setting stage (in which a specific area of collaboration and strategies for implementation are established by key individuals), and an initial implementation stage of a pilot project or pilot program with co-leaders, one from the MSI and one from the Cancer Center (in which preliminary data is acquired) for the purpose of enhancing the competitive potential of an NCI grant application.