COMMONWEALTHTIMES.ORG @theCT
THE INDEPENDENT PRESS OF VIRGINIA COMMONWEALTH UNIVERSITY 2019, 2020, 2021 Newspaper Pacemaker Winner
VOL. 63, NO.9 OCTOBER 20, 2021
FY21 Sponsored Funding by Department
Illustration by Lauren Johnson
VCU RECEIVES $363 MILLION IN RESEARCH FUNDS; 25% INCREASE SINCE 2018 LINDSEY WEST Contributing Writer
VCU’s MCV campus received more funding than the Monroe Park campus, however the Monroe Park research funds, HE UNIVERSITY ANNOUNCED A RECORD including the College of Engineering, the amount of research funds collect- College of Humanities and Sciences and ed, totaling about $363 million the School of Business, have been increasfor the 2021 fiscal year. Nearly all VCU ing, Rao said. The Qatar campus receives departments received an increase in re- funding from the Qatar Foundation. search budget, according to P. Srirama Rao, VCU’s vice president for research and innovation. VCU departments that received funding include business, social work, nursing, the college of health professions, dentistIt really becomes ry, pharmacy, engineering, the college of an opportunity for humanities and sciences, arts, medicine, undergraduates and and government and public affairs. Medicine received the most funding with over graduate students to $183 million. be doing things outside Various VCU schools and departments of the classroom, to be received the research grants for their proposed research ideas on July 1, the start of having experiences that the fiscal year, Rao said. are really value-added According to Rao, who has no relation that you just don’t get to VCU President Michael Rao, the money came from national funding, state fundby reading about it.” ing and funding from industry or founStephen Fong, Director of dations gifts. For example, the Massey the Center for Integrative Life Cancer Center received national funding Sciences Education from the National Cancer Institute. “They [researchers] compete on the national scene and they receive this funding,” “ The medical school was Rao said. “So for instance, if you are a fac- roughly half of the entire 363 ulty in mass communication and you [million],” Rao said, “so they are wrote a grant and you got funded this the biggest recipient of funding. time around from a national agency, Following the medical school, the funding would flow to your colit was the school of education, enlege or school.” gineering and humanities and The university’s research funding sciences, if you look at our totals $362,906,366. VCU ranks dual campuses.” highly in research funding in comThe university is participarison to other public research pating in a handful of ongouniversities, Rao said. ing research projects. One According to the National Sciincludes research by Steence Foundation, VCU ranks No. 64 phen Fong, a professor in for Higher Education Research and the department of chemical Development expenditures for puband life science engineerlic institutions. ing specializing in metabolic
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engineering and systems biology, according to his faculty biography. Fong is the director of the Center for Integrative Life Sciences Education (CILSE) and the Integrative Life Sciences Doctoral Program at VCU. VCU departments and schools are continuously beginning research projects and ideas as well as working on studies that have already begun. Fong has been working on a collaborative project with the Science Museum of Virginia and the University of Richmond, analyzing the heat levels across Richmond and the subsequent impacts on health. “This summer we were going around and measuring air quality, using air quality sensors in a similar fashion, which can be linked to things like respiratory illness, asthma, other things like that,” Fong said. “So we were also trying to figure out if there’s variation on air quality and related illnesses on a neighborhood-by-neighborhood basis, essentially.” Both undergraduate and graduate students have the chance to become involved in research at VCU, Fong said. “It really becomes an opportunity for undergraduates and graduate students to be doing things outside of the classroom, to be having experiences that are really value-added that you just don’t get by reading about it,” Fong said. The application process for receiving research grants presents research opportunities to many institutions, professionals and students. Proposals tend to be 15 to 25 pages of scientific or scholarly content, a budget and paperwork related to VCU research, Fong said. “This is funding that they’ve been successful at obtaining by going through that process of writing a proposal, getting it reviewed and getting it funded,” Fong said. See RESEARCH on page 3
DEPARTMENT
Total FY21 Sponsored Programs Awards
BUSINESS
$872,118.00
SOCIAL WORK
$1,150,236.00
NURSING
$2,762,685.00
CHP
$4,191,917.00
DENTISTRY
$4,876,699.00
PHARMACY
$9,372,761.00
ENGINEERING
$31,368,257.00
EDUCATION
$35,536,647.00
CHS
$22,338,517.00
ARTS (INCLUDES VCUQ)
$40,046,399.00
MEDICINE
$183,412,511.00
WILDER
$2,067,189.00
OTHER (OVPRI, PROVOST, FINANCE)
$24,910,430.00
VP FOR FINANCE & ADMIN
$239,353.00
VP FOR RESEARCH
$21,046,855.00
PROVOST OFFICE
$918,743.00
VP FOR STUDENT AFFAIRS
$440,000.00
VP FOR ACADEMIC AFFAIRS
$2,265,479.00
TOTAL
$362,906,366.00
Information courtesy of P. Srirama Rao Infographic by Bailey Wood