CUES Grants Nominee and Applicant Q&A

CUES aims to send award notifications before the end of the Spring semester and by mid/late May at the latest. Applicants/nominees not selected for funding can opt to receive feedback on their submissions over the summer or anytime once the Fall semester begins.

Grant funding is typically disbursed in late July/early August, after the start of the new fiscal year and ahead of the official start of the Fall semester. Fellows/Grantees often begin grant work in the summer (writing IRBs, preparing protocols, and otherwise preparing the groundwork for the official start in the Fall).

For CUES Distinguished Fellowships, each college or unit is limited to two nominations per cycle, as the nomination guidelines state. Some colleges/units, but not all, hold internal competitions to select their nominees; please contact your college/unit to find out more. CUES Spanning Boundaries Challenge grants are not subject to a nomination process.

This is discouraged by CUES given the scope/capacity expectations of our funded projects, and other funding considerations. Please contact CUES if this situation applies to you.

If your Fellowship funding/project has ended by the time the Spanning Boundaries grant begins, this is allowed. If your Fellowship funding/project is still ongoing when the Spanning Boundaries grant is expected to begin, the answer depends on your role/effort allocation on the Spanning Boundaries grant. Please contact CUES if this situation applies to you.

If your funding/project has ended by the time the Fellowship begins, this is allowed. If your funding/project is still ongoing when the Fellowship grant is expected to begin, the answer depends on your role/effort allocation on the Spanning Boundaries grant. Please contact CUES if this situation applies to you.

CUES Fellowships are awarded to a single faculty fellow who proposes and serves as lead for the proposed project and research study. Including and funding faculty collaborators as part of a CUES Fellowship is allowed and even encouraged when appropriate. Faculty collaborators often co-author publications, presentations, etc., stemming out of CUES grants, including fellowships. When appropriate, faculty collaborators may pursue two independent Fellowship nominations by their respective colleges or primary units of affiliation, as long as their individual project and research studies are different, independent and competitive as stand-alone projects. Collaborators whose interests align with a CUES Spanning Boundaries Grant theme may pursue such a grant, if suitable and appropriate. Please see Spanning Boundaries Challenge details for more information. 

Certainly, a CUES Fellowship or grant may be part of a sabbatical proposal and as such, either start or continue during sabbatical time. Alternatively, a faculty member might plan to be nominated or begin an awarded Fellowship or grant upon returning from sabbatical. We discourage plans to defer the start of a CUES grant due to a planned sabbatical that does not include the CUES project. Such situations should be disclosed, and such projects still compete with all nominations/applications following the expected timeline.

Unlike other funding venues, CUES does not fund the creation of new courses or curricular redesign projects. If your project depends upon a recently created course or a teaching assignment that could change, we encourage you to address how your project will adapt under eventualities such as low enrollment or teaching assignment changes.

CUES funds projects that (1) address innovation, gaps, and/or grand challenges in teaching and learning and (2) generate new knowledge through a robustly designed research study aligned with the project’s aims and goals. Proposed projects must include a research component tied to the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) and be aligned with the CUES mission. See competition pages for more details. 

SoTL, sometimes referred to as teaching and learning inquiry, entails relevant, systematic study of some aspect of teaching and learning centering the student experience and is often grounded in particular contexts. SoTL studies vary in scope and aim, yet include the following elements: Research Questions, Study Design, Theoretical Framing, and Data Collection & Analysis. In preparing your proposal, please consider consulting SoTL resources such as The SoTL Guide: (Re)Orienting the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, or Engaging in the scholarship of teaching and learning: a guide to the process, and how to develop a project from start to finish, along with any other sources relevant to your topic.

Proposals involving human subjects should address the need for IRB review as relevant to the project. Proposals that require it should present a realistic and feasible plan for securing IRB approval before the start of the second semester of funding. Applicants should pursue any necessary training or mentorship for preparing an IRB application as needed. 

For projects that rely on rapidly evolving technologies (e.g., AI), your proposal should address how you will monitor and adapt to technological shifts or developments over the course of the study in a way that doesn’t compromise the project goals.

Applicants should adhere to University guidance regarding the disclosure and citation of AI use in preparing the submission package, including but not limited to the project and research study narrative. AI usage disclosures are expected so as to honor transparency, ethical process, research integrity, and to support a well-informed and efficient review process.

Deans always sign if there are college funding commitments, and sometimes in other cases (e.g., faculty time allocated towards the CUES grant being released at the college level). 

Budget review and approval should come from whoever holds the college-level administrative authority to approve budgetary commitments at both the college and departmental levels.

CUES budget items are subject to university rules and regulations. University regulations largely constrain contracting and hiring personnel from abroad/outside the U.S. Contracting requires making uniqueness arguments, and it is generally an involved process. If this situation applies to you, you are encouraged to work with your business office to review pertinent University regulations and to contact cues@arizona.edu in advance of proposing any such funding in your grant/fellowship application.

Student stipends (external awards) and/or gift cards may be included in the CUES budget, subject to department/college/unit university rules. Nominees/applicants should work with their business office to properly include such budget items as allowed/appropriate.

Yes, the grant budget can be utilized this way; however, nominees whose projects depend on such arrangements are strongly encouraged to disclose this as part of the nomination, and to include approval of the overload by the cognizant unit lead (department head/college dean).

Yes. Abridged CVs should include/highlight entries that are most relevant for CUES fellowships/grants. Typically, some of those elements are current/recent, which helps argue for a candidate’s strengths relative to the CUES mission and grant criteria. 

The dean may submit two letters, one addressing the requirements for the department head’s letter and one the requirements for the dean’s letter. Nominees may also choose to include a letter from an associate dean, in lieu of the dean’s letter, if appropriate.

Some additional letters of support may come from extramural institutions/organizations as relevant. Letters from U of A colleagues are also important given the CUES mission and the aims of the Center's grants and fellowships.

Once a nomination/application package is complete, either the nominee or their college/unit designee may submit the package. Different colleges/units have their own processes for limited submissions, but generally each NetID may submit up to two packages through the system. Designees should fill in the nominee's/applicant’s name and other details in the online submission system as though the nominee/applicant was submitting the package. 

Nominees should combine "Other Letters of Support" into a single PDF document (no PDF Portfolios, please) when submitting through the online system.

No. As the nomination guidelines state under “Submission Details,” letters of support are a required part of the proposal package. As such, they are to be submitted online by the nomination/application deadline.