NIH Grant Writing Series
Six weeks to a stronger proposal
The NIH Grant Writing Series is designed to prepare early-career faculty at Illinois to submit a strong proposal to the National Institutes of Health. The series consists of 90-minute seminar and discussion sessions addressing various aspects of the grant submission process.
Seminar Series
The seminar series, held every other spring, is led by faculty who have demonstrated a history of success with NIH proposals. These sessions provide information and advice on all aspects of the grant writing process. The seminar series is open to all Illinois investigators.
Session 1: Introduction to the NIH
This session provides an overview of the structure of the NIH and the various funding mechanisms. Participants will learn to effectively communicate with Program Officers and get tips for planning a successful NIH proposal.
Session 2: NIH Peer Review Process
This session covers the review and scoring criteria for NIH proposals and the intricacies of the NIH peer review process. Participants will learn how to tailor their proposal to fit the NIH criteria.
Session 3: Specific Aims Development
This session covers how to develop the Specific Aims section of NIH proposals.
Session 4: Building a Successful Proposal, Part 1
This session focuses on developing the research strategy, writing the abstract and project narrative, and addressing rigor and transparency for NIH proposals.
Session 5: Building a Successful Proposal, Part 2
This session covers how to develop the administrative and compliance sections of NIH proposals.
Session 6: Responding to Reviews
Your grant went through peer review, but didn’t get funded. Now what? This session will address how to respond to the reviewers’ comments, interpret critiques, and use feedback from reviewers or mentors to improve your grant proposal.
Mentorship Program
In addition to the seminar series, selected nominees will participate in a peer review workshop and three meetings with a faculty member who has a history of NIH proposal success. While the seminars are open to campus, only selected faculty may participate in the complete series.
Specific Aims Peer Review Workshop
This session is loosely modeled after a study section with the participants acting as reviewers. Participants will act as primary or secondary reviewers, preparing written critiques of aims pages prior to the workshop. The critiques will be discussed as a group. Participants will get a taste of what it’s like to be on a review panel in addition to receiving peer feedback that will help them improve their Specific Aims page.
Mentor Meetings (three monthly meetings are recommended)
Participants are expected to schedule a minimum of three one-on-one meetings with their assigned mentor to receive feedback on their proposal at various stages (i.e., specific aims, research plan, and the first draft of the proposal).
Selected faculty must demonstrate support from their department. Deans and department heads are invited to nominate early-career faculty for participation in the series with a letter of support. If not nominated by their deans or department heads, faculty may also nominate themselves with a letter of support from their department head, a copy of their CV, and a brief summary of their research interests.
Please contact Maggie Berg for more information and subscribe to the IHSI newsletter to receive updates about joining future cohorts.
2024 Cohort
School of Information Sciences
Department of Geography & Graphic Information Science
Department of Psychology
Department of Kinesiology & Community Health
School of Information Sciences
Department of Educational Psychology
Department of Kinesiology & Community Health
CI MED Neurosurgery
School of Social Work
Department of Sociology
Department of Recreation, Sport, & Tourism
Department of Comparative Biosciences
2022 Cohort
Eva Fischer
Department of Evolution, Ecology & Behavior
Pamela Martinez
Department of Microbiology
Vishal Verma
Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering
Chris Gaulke
Department of Pathobiology
Moses Okumu
School of Social Work
Shulei Wang
Department of Statistics
Sarah Geiger
Department of Kinesiology & Community Health
Minakshi Raj
Department of Kinesiology & Community Health
Yi-Cheng Wang
Department of Food Science & Human Nutrition
Lisa Guntzviller
Department of Communication
Nathan Todd
Department of Psychology
Yang Zahao
Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering
2020 Cohort
Jont Allen
Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering
Mary Flaherty
Department of Speech & Hearing Science
Hua Wang
Department of Materials Science & Engineering
Charles Blatti
National Center for Supercomputing Applications
Hyunil Kim
School of Social Work
Angela Di Fulvio
Department of Nuclear Plasma & Radiological Engineering
Annette McCoy
Department of Veterinary Clinical Medicine
Mihn Do
Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering
Mary Pietrowicz
Applied Research Institute
2019 Cohort
Cabral Bigman-Galimore
Department of Communication
Dominika Pindus
Department of Kinesiology & Community Health
Charee Thompson
Department of Communication
Liv Davila
Education, Policy, Organization, & Leadership
Yvonne Redman
School of Music
Justina Zurauskiene
The Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology
Hee-Sun Han
Department of Chemistry
Jodi Schneider
iSchool
Hyojung Kang
Department of Kinesiology & Community Health
Beth Stadtmueller
Department of Biochemistry
2018 Cohort
Shiva Abbaszadeh
Department of Nuclear, Plasma & Radiological Engineering
Judy Havlicek*
School of Social Work
Brian Monson
Department of Speech & Hearing Science
Elizabeth Biggs
Department of Special Education
Naiman Khan
Department of Kinesiology & Community Health
Huanyu (Joe) Qiao
Department of Comparative Biosciences
Catherine Corr
Department of Special Education
Adam Konopka
Department of Kinesiology & Community Health
Alessandro Rigolon
Department of Recreation, Sport & Tourism
Neha Gothe
Department of Kinesiology & Community Health
Laura Mattie
Department of Speech & Hearing Science
Abigail Wooldridge*
Department of Industrial & Enterprise Systems Engineering
* Peer review workshop attendee
2017 Cohort
Liza Berdychevsky
Department of Recreation, Sport & Tourism
Sandraluz Lara-Cinisomo
Department of Kinesiology & Community Health
Rebecca Smith
Department of Pathobiology
Joe Cohen
Department of Psychology
Ian Mertes
Department of Speech & Hearing Science
William Witola
Department of Pathobiology
Makoto Inoue
Department of Comparative Biosciences
Laura Rice
Department of Kinesiology & Community Health
Hans-Friedrich Koehn
Department of Psychology
Sepideh Sadaghiani
Department of Psychology
2016 Cohort
Anna Arthur Parker
Department of Food Science & Human Nutrition
Li-Qing Chen
Department of Plant Biology
Allison Hansen
Department of Entomology
Jessica Brinkworth
Department of Anthropology
Wawrzyniec Dobrucki
Department of Bioengineering
Citlali Lopez-Ortiz
Department of Kinesiology & Community Health
Matt Browning
Department of Recreation, Sport & Tourism
Elizabeth Driskell
Department of Pathobiology
SungWoo Nam
Department of Mechanical Science & Engineering
Meghan Burke
Department of Special Education
Catharine Fairbairn
Department of Psychology
Kai Zhang
Department of Biochemistry
2015 Cohort
Justin Aronoff
Department of Speech & Hearing Science
Paul Eubig
Department of Comparative Biosciences
Tara Leytham Powell
School of Social Work
Chung-Yi Chiu
Department of Kinesiology & Community Health
Andy Ferguson
Department of Materials Science & Engineering
Zeynep Madak-Erdogan
Department of Food Science & Human Nutrition
Catherine Christian
School of Molecular & Cellular Biology
Manuel Hernandez
Department of Kinesiology & Community Health
David Molitor
Department of Finance
Ahmed Elbanna
Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering
Hong Jin
Department of Biochemistry
64
faculty trained through the NIH Grant Writing Series
$57M+
in NIH funding awarded to participating faculty