California State University, Long Beach Receives Record $40 Million in External Funding in 2001-02

California State University, Long Beach received a record $40.77 million in funding from grants and contracts during the 2001-02 academic year, according to figures released by the campus’ Office of University Research.

The new record of $40,773,990 tops the previous year’s total of $39,199,161. It continues a steady surge in external funding received by faculty and staff at the university, which reached the $10 million mark in 1989-90, $20 million in 1993-94, and the $30 million mark in 1997-98.
“As an institution of higher learning, we have an obligation to conduct research, and our continued and growing success in receiving grants and contracts is a testament to the quality of the faculty and staff we have here on the campus,” said CSULB President Robert C. Maxson. “And ultimately, the beneficiary of these efforts in grants and contracts is the students.”

In addition to the overall funding record, Cal State Long Beach faculty and staff submitted a record 242 grant proposals, eclipsing the old record of 236 in 1999-2000.

“We’ve got a serious interest in scholarship here,” noted James Brett, director of the CSULB Office of University Research. “There are a large number of people who understand that research is inherent in the transmission of knowledge from one generation to the next, and that’s what we are doing --a generation grows up, gains new knowledge and then teaches it to the next generation that comes along.”

Of the $40.77 million received, $15.6 million came from county and city agencies followed by $9.9 million from federal agencies, $6.25 million from collaborations with other universities and a little more than $5 million from California agencies.

Brett attributes the campus’ success in garnering external funding to a couple of different areas. First, he credits the relationship of the university’s senior administrators with the rest of the campus. President Maxson and other administrators have set a clear and positive tone on the importance of doing research at the campus.

The recent influx of new faculty members to the campus has also had a hand in increased external funding. Brett said many departments are hiring new faculty members who are bringing grants with them from their previous institutions. He also noted that many more faculty are having post-doctorate experiences before they arrive and take their first tenure-track position.
Among some of the significant grant/contract awards earned last year by CSULB faculty and staff were:

• The College of Education received a five-year, $3.4 million grant (part of $15 million project) from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development and the Office of Educational Research and Improvement for a project that examines the literacy development, in both Spanish and English, of Spanish-speaking school-aged children;
  
  
• The Biological Sciences Department and six faculty members were awarded a four-year, $2.6 million grant from the National Institute of General Medical Sciences (NIGMS), one of the National Institutes of Health, for a variety of projects that will include undergraduate and graduate students on research that has biomedical applications;
  
  
• The Department of Social Work received a three-year, $1.95 million grant from the Los Angeles County Department of Mental Health for a program that provides stipends and tuition for graduate students interested in careers in the mental health field. The CSULB project is designed to deal with the serious shortfall of master’s–prepared social workers in the area of mental health;
  
  
• The Occupational Studies Department was awarded a five-year, $885,632 grant from the U.S. Department of Education for a project that will train 50 paraeducators (instructional assistants) from a nearby school district to be bilingual teachers. Titled Project ESCALERA, the collaborative program will provide participants with a comprehensive and accelerated training program leading to a bachelor’s degree and teaching credential;
  
  
• The Department of Nursing received a three-year, $98,480 grant from the California Department of Health and Human Services to support its successful Health on Wheels program, a mobile school-based health clinic that visits 10 schools and offers free physical exams, medical care for minor illnesses and health education.

“There is this sense that things are coming together,” Brett pointed out, referring to the university’s external funding potential. “Cal State Long Beach is not going to turn into a research institution; we are dedicated to instruction and our first mission is to do that well. Nevertheless, instruction and research are intimately related, partly through faculty programs of scholarship and partly through undergraduate and graduate research experiences.

“Our faculty are very competitive on the national level and our students always do very well in the CSU Student Research Competition, the McNair Program and the annual Long Beach Biomedical Research Symposium,” he added. “The first $40 million was trail blazing for the institution; the next $60 million will come in much less time.”