University Research Council

Grants Review Committee

University Research Council (URC) has set up a system of intramural funds to enable eligible faculty members and graduate students to compete and obtain research grants which could assist them in obtaining preliminary data that may support their extramural grant applications.

Grants Review Committee (GRC) is an administrative body which evaluates proposals received for funding from the University-wide unrestricted endowment for research and other internal sources that may be allocated. GRC is composed of independent reviewers who are an autonomous and impartial group of experts serving to guarantee the integrity and consistency of an open and transparent grant funding process.

Researchers may apply in the following categories:

Leaping Leopard Program (LLP) – geared towards obtaining extramural grants
Research Support Program (RSP) – will accept applications related to capacity building and graduate students’ research projects.

For details please refer to the Policy and Guidelines for URC Intramural Funding.

GRC reviews grant applications from the viewpoint of:

Significance - Does the submitted research proposal aims to examine an important issue or barriers to further development in a particular field – implementation research?
Innovation/novelty - Does the research proposal suggest alternative methods to address an important issue through innovative/novel intervention(s)?
Approach/Methodology - Is the overall strategy, methods, and analyses robust enough to accomplish aims and objectives as stated in the research proposal? Are these explained in sufficient detail so that the study can be repeated by another set of investigators?
Investigator - Does the principal investigator and collaborators (as applicable) have the desired expertise to carry out the proposed research?
Environment - Are the resources available for the study adequate and do the investigators have sufficient institutional support for conducting the research?