PURPOSE

The Office of Environmental Stewardship and Sustainability and JMU Research and Scholarship are jointly administering Presidential Undergraduate Research Grants to fund undergraduate students' research, scholarly, and creative experiences related to environmental stewardship. The grants are offered to further faculty scholarship and to provide meaningful undergraduate student learning experiences in any discipline.

TERMS

JMU full-time, instructional faculty members in all disciplines are encouraged to submit proposals. Awards will be for 10 to 15 hours of student work per week at $9 per hour or less, not to exceed $3,800, during the 2018-19 academic year. Funds are not available for faculty compensation, supplies, equipment, or travel. Funds will be transferred to selected faculty members' departments to hire the undergraduate student employee.

Proposals will only be considered if they meet all of the following requirements:

1. The applicant must be a full-time, instructional faculty member at JMU for AY2018-19.
2. The student selected must be enrolled at JMU as an undergraduate for fall 2018 and eligible to work for JMU as a student employee for the designated number of hours.
3. The faculty member's department must agree to complete the hiring process following guidelines by Student Employment and other JMU requirements. Stipends are not permitted; the student must submit timesheets to the faculty member's department.
4. Students cannot be paid more than $9 per hour. The student's total hours spent working on the project must result in compensation from this award as approved in the proposal, not to exceed $3800. All hours and expenditures must be completed by May 15, 2019.
5. The applicant agrees to submit a final report by May 30, 2019. The one page report should summarize the results and contributions to the university. The report should also include documentation of the student's work hours and compensation. The report may be used on JMU websites and other communications.
6. Proposals for projects involving the use of human subjects must include confirmation of Institutional Review Board (IRB) approval. Projects involving use of live, vertebrate animals must include confirmation of Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee approval.
7. Proposals must be developed in close consultation with the applicant's academic unit head. A signed approval form must be submitted with the proposal.

SELECTION CRITERIA

Proposal review by the selection committee will be guided by the following criteria:

1. Completeness 
2. Clarity
3. Alignment with the eligibility guidelines.
4. Potential to advance environmental stewardship.
5. Impact on the faculty member and student.

PROPOSAL SUBMISSION

A proposal and approval form must be electronically submitted:

Part 1: A single PDF file of the full proposal.
Part 2: A scan of the signed approval form as a PDF file.

Attach both PDFs to a single email and send to stewardship@ jmu.edu by 5 pm on October 15, 2018. Only complete proposals with both files attached to a single email and received by the deadline will be considered.

Part 1: The proposal should include the following:

1. Applicant's name, title, department, and email address.
2. Student employee's name and major (if available).
3. Title of the undergraduate research, scholarly, or creative project.
4. Summary of the undergraduate project including the student's tasks, total hours of work, and amount of funding requested (less than 250 words).
5. Discussion of how the project will advance environmental stewardship, the applicant's scholarly efforts, and the student's educational experience (less than 250 words).
6. IRB/Animal Care and Use Committee approval (if applicable).

Examples of campus research projects from other institutions that have won an annual Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education (AASHE) research award are at https://www.aashe.org/get-involved/awards/winners/.

Part 2: The approval form must be signed, scanned, and attached to the submission email along with the proposal. Download the approval form.

NOTIFICATION

Awards will be announced in late October 2018. Up to ten awards will be made.