Developing your Research, Scholarship, and Creative Practice

If you have recently arrived at Washington University and want to get started on research in Arts & Sciences, please make note of the following websites: 

Office of the Vice Chancellor for Research (OVCR)
The OVCR offers resources for identifying funding sources, research analytics, and university research announcements. 

Core Facilities
Search and find core facilities to help with your research. 

Arts & Sciences Computing

A&S Computing provides technology resources to A&S faculty, staff, and students. Services range from reservable computer classrooms to High Performance Computing access to personalized client support.

Research Infrastructure Services

Research Infrastructure Services includes access to a scientific computer cluster and data storage platform. The service is available to all WashU faculty, staff, or students involved in research.

WashU ONE
ONE is a portal that connects you to systems and services across WashU. Think of it as an app store for university systems and services. 

Arts & Sciences Strategic Plan
Explore the Arts & Sciences Strategic Plan to see how your research interests may align with its Signature Initiatives.

University Advancement Foundation Relations

Supports Danforth faculty, leaders, and GAIN via funding leads, funder research, grant narrative preparation, and other submission/stewardship tasks

Pilot/Seed Proposal Funding

• "Seeding Projects for Enabling Excellence & Distinction” (SPEED) program 
  • The SPEED in Research program was created to stimulate innovative work that leads to significant outcomes in research, scholarship, and creative practice.
• A&S Strategic Plan Incubator for Transdisciplinary Futures
  • The Incubator for Transdisciplinary Futures was created to catalyze and support bold collaborations that will foster the future of scholarly inquiry.
• A&S Strategic Plan TRIADS
  • At TRIADS, our mission is to explore new datasets and new techniques to better understand and address critical problems facing society today. We create and support transdisciplinary collaborations among scholars to connect big data to big questions.
• Weidenbaum Center Internal Grant Opportunities
  • The Weidenbaum Center supports social science by funding research projects conducted by faculty at Washington University.
• Center for the Humanities Internal Funding Opportunities
  • A variety of internally funded opportunities are offered through the Center for the Humanities. These programs are intended to enhance the ability of WU faculty and students to compete for external funding for their research or creative work.
• Here and Next Seed Funding
  • Three tiers of seed funding will be awarded to catalyze interdisciplinary research activities in the Here & Next priority areas.
• Other Internal Seed Funding Programs
  • Internal Seed Funding opportunities provide funds to support research activities that may lead to extramural funding.

Course Release/Leaves/Fellowships

• Competitive Course Release Program
  • Learn more about this new program to enhance faculty research productivity which provides a course release for tenured faculty who are nearing completion of a major project.
• Competitive Fellowship Leave Program
  • Faculty in the Humanities and Social Sciences may apply to this program, which provides leave time at full pay, with Arts & Sciences making up the difference between the salary amount provided by the granting agency and the faculty member’s base pay.
• Center for the Humanities Research & Funding Opportunities
  • Washington University provides significant internal funding to support and encourage research and scholarship at the university.
• Center for the Literary Arts Creative Practice Workshop
  • The WashU Creative Practice Workshop is an interdisciplinary workshop that provides an opportunity for WashU creative practice faculty across various fields to collaborate, produce, and share work.

Proposal Development, and Paper/Proposal Review Programs

• Proposal Evaluation Program
  • The Proposal Evaluation Program provides faculty members with an opportunity to submit their scientific and research plans for external funding to a panel of internal and external reviewers ahead of the funding sponsor deadline.
• OVCR Scientific Editing Service for Proposals
  • The Research Development Office offers a review and editing service for grant proposals.
• OVCR Idea and Team Development
  • The Research Development Office offers tools to help find a collaborator, Research Networking Groups (RNGs) and seed funding. The also offer help putting together a white paper. 
• OVCR Proposal Management Services
  • Our Research Development Office (RDO) also offers advice for any proposal and answer questions about any opportunity.
• Weidenbaum Pre-Review Program
  • The Weidenbaum Center will fund up to five proposals (each) from the departments of Economics, Sociology, and Political Science (though the program is open to all of the social sciences).

Workshops

• How to Write Winning Grant Proposals
  • A three-part seminar for faculty presented by Dr. John Robertson of Grant Writers’ Seminars & Workshops.

Compliance

Required Training

Learn@Work
Learn @ work is consolidated, streamlined, personalized training experience for the WashU community. Everyone must complete:

• Personnel Activity Report Training
• Code of Conduct
• Conflict of Interest Disclosure
• Financial Conflict of Interest

Working with Chemicals, Lasers, etc.

• Environmental Health and Safety (EHS) will be your partner.
  • Talk to your department about your EHS contact specialist and meet with them in person to go over lab set up and needs.
    • If not clear who to work with, you can look up your EHS contact. 
    • You can also contact Bradley King in EHS as a backup.
• Complete EHS Basic Lab Safety Training through Learn@Work
• Submit applications for working with hazardous chemicals, infectious agents, etc.

Working with Animals

• Meet with your departmental resources.
• Submit an animal research protocol.
• For more information, visit: Animal Care and Use Guidelines and Training.

Working with Humans

• Take the human subjects research training (aka “CITI”).
• If applicable, take HIPPA training.
• Submit Human Subjects Research Application(s)
• Attend an information session with Martha Jones, Director of the Human Research Protection Office (HRPO)