Grant Program and Application

2023 Grant Program Call for Proposals

Penn State’s Center for Security Research and Education (CSRE) offers grants to support interdisciplinary research and education addressing threats to human security, public safety, and democratic institutions from any source.

2023 Grant Program

Submission deadline: March 13, 2023
Apply via Penn State InfoReady

CSRE is pleased to launch its 2023 grant program. The Center’s mission is to enhance interdisciplinary research, teaching, and outreach relevant to the protection and preservation of individuals, infrastructure, institutions, and society.

Social and ethical changes, demographic shifts, urbanization, global norms, environmental change, access to natural resources, diseases, the global economy, supply chains, natural resources, governance, technology’s role in military and civil capabilities, shifts in global power centers—these are the security drivers affecting the future. CSRE is interested in your ideas on how to study these factors and create interdisciplinary solutions.

The Center is looking for innovative concepts with high risk/high reward approaches. Proposals must demonstrate inter-, multi-, or trans-disciplinarity and we highly encourage teams with representation from multiple units across the University System and partners with other universities and research centers, industry, and/or government organizations.

Grants will be funded up to $30,000 and we encourage cost matching from participating units.

Proposals are due by March 13, 2023 via Penn State’s InfoReady portal.

The anticipated award notifications will be sent on May 15, 2023 for performance beginning on July 1, 2023. The periods of performance are flexible but are typically 12 to 24 months.

Program Emphasis

While any proposal relevant to CSRE’s mission is welcome and will receive full consideration, the Center is particularly interested in supporting research in five specific areas:

Biosecurity/Biodefense. Suggested topics include actions to counter or reduce biological threats, and prepare for or recover from bio-incidents that potentially impact human, animal, plant, or environmental health. Also, proposals relating to ways to advance science and policy to address emerging pandemics and global catastrophic biological risks, whether natural or man-made.

Climate Change and Environmental Security. Suggested topics include rapid climate change and increasing weather extremes; depletion of natural resources and geological hazards; environmental security issues that lead to humanitarian disasters, and regional tensions; environmental risks to military activities; environmental risks to energy supplies, food supplies, and water security; loss of livelihoods and forced migration or displacement.

Shared Security Challenges. Suggested topics include international cooperation on shared challenges such as arms control and nonproliferation, state-actor aggression, terrorism, and transnational crime (e.g., human trafficking, cybercrime, illegal fishing or mining, and drug trafficking).

Next-Gen Technologies. Suggested topics include blockchain, cyber security, artificial intelligence & machine learning, quantum computing, new materials, biotechnology, drones, and hypersonics.

Space/Counter-Space. Suggested topics include threats to civil or military space architectures, space domain awareness, improved spatial and temporal detection of threats, improving space access, space policy, space and terrestrial weather, space commerce defense, integration of space/air/land/sea/cyber operations, and space junk.

Eligibility

Any full-time Penn State faculty member (as defined by Penn State Academic Policy AC21) and full-time Penn State research and engineering staff members (see Penn State Human Resources, Research, and Engineering for a non-exclusive list of job titles) may submit proposals as a Principal Investigator (PI). There are no specific eligibility restrictions for Co-PIs or key personnel.

Submission Requirements

There are no set prescriptions for proposal format, length, etc. Follow proposal protocols common to your specific discipline. However, proposals must:

  • Reflect the inter-, multi-, or transdisciplinary nature of contemporary security challenges by incorporating expertise from multiple, diverse academic disciplines. Strong proposals will show collaboration among multiple colleges, institutes, and/or Commonwealth Campuses
  • Articulate the relevance of the proposal to the mission and objectives of CSRE
  • Clearly describe the objectives of the research, including data collection and analysis where applicable;
  • Provide a detailed budget for how CSRE funds will be used;
  • Include endorsements from the applicant’s and co-applicants’ department heads, deans, and/or chancellors.
  • Applicants and co-applicants must disclose recent/current/pending support (and applicants must comply with Penn State’s policies regarding outside professional activities, conflict of commitment, and international activities).
  • Provide a status update for work still in progress that involves a previous CSRE seed grant, or if the work is complete, evidence of the outcomes and descriptions showing what is new and different in this proposal from a previous one; and

Proposals will receive additional favorable consideration if they include commitments for matching funds from one or more departments, colleges, or institutes. A letter of support from the unit department head must be included indicating the amount and terms of the matching funding. In kind matches are also encouraged and accepted; investigators must specify the type of in kind match and provide an estimate of value.

Grants that seek to create/expand educational opportunities should clearly describe why CSRE support will provide unique value to innovative interdisciplinary curriculum development and an endorsement from the applicant’s department head, dean, or chancellor that the curriculum has the potential for lasting impact.

Proposals must describe how the grant will lead to additional external funding, including identifying potential funding sources, submission deadlines, and subject matter. If the applicant intends to use CSRE funding in conjunction with funds obtained from other grant sources, the proposal should include a commitment to use CSRE funding only for the express purposes described in the proposal.

Allowable Expenses

Examples of allowable expenses include:

  • Faculty salary (e.g., course buyouts and/or summer salary) not greater than $15,000
  • Salary/stipend for undergraduate or graduate research assistants
  • Purchases of research materials including books
  • Funding to support operating expenses for a public event
  • Travel for research
  • Travel to present research findings or testimony to government or international agency groups

Application & Selection Process

Grant proposals will be evaluated by an interdisciplinary committee of three or more representatives from CSRE contributing units. Proposals must satisfy all eligibility criteria. The committee will evaluate the proposals comparatively and recommend to the CSRE Director those that are most worthy of receiving CSRE grant funding. It is possible that a fully qualified proposal may not be among the best qualified.

Proposals that demonstrate a high-risk/high-impact approach with the ability to scale will be weighted more heavily. Other evaluation criteria include: significance of the proposed concept and potential for external follow-on funding, relevance of the concept to CSRE’s mission and program emphasis, the level of interdisciplinarity described, the level of real or in-kind cost matches, and the amount of participation from researchers from CSRE contributing units.

Applications should be submitted on InfoReady by March 13, 2023.

Expectations of Grant Recipients

As a condition to accepting CSRE funds, grant recipients must agree to the following:

  • Investigators are expected to provide an annual project status update (beginning on the one-year anniversary of your award) and upon completion of the project. CSRE will provide a report format
  • Recipients must appropriately acknowledge CSRE support in relevant publications, speaking engagements, and promotional activities. Information on the use of the CSRE logo may be obtained from csre@psu.edu.
  • If you need to make changes to the project team, description, design, or budget, please send a request to csre@psu.edu with the change details and justification
  • Upon request, recipients must be willing to review future CSRE grant proposals and are encouraged to participate in CSRE-sponsored events.

Questions? Need clarification? CSRE encourages coordination and open discussion during your proposal development process. Potential applicants may contact John Hodgson, Associate Director, at jgh161@psu.edu.