Support for Innovation

A central aim of the CU Population Center is to provide early support for innovative, collaborative projects with the potential to substantially advance understanding in one of CUPC’s central research themes, all of which are related to the mission of the NICHD Population Dynamics Branch (PDB).

For this purpose, CUPC awards approximately $50,000 in Developmental Grants each year. This includes both larger Pilot Research Grants for amounts between $3,000 and $15,000 as well as Rapid Response Small Grants limited to $3,000.

Please contact Rick Rogers, Development Core Director, for any questions about these grants. Also, see below for a list of current and prior projects supported by the CUPC seed grant program.

In addition, the Institute of Behavioral Science also offers pilot grants for projects. Population-focus scholars with a project that does not fully fall within the scope of NICHD Population Dynamics Branch activities can apply for these funds instead.

Finally, the CU – Boulder Research and Innovation Office offers larger seed grants to foster interdisciplinary collaboration, and which many of our affiliates have obtained to further develop extramural research grant applications and fully develop research projects.

Recent Intramural Grants Awarded to Affiliates

CUPC pilot grants (NICHD-funded):

Jason Boardman: “Developing a Neighborhood Advisory Council for the Denver Study of the Built and Social Environment.” ($6,917).

Kate Coleman-Minahan: “Structural Vulnerability and Contraception among Mexico-Origin Immigrants.” ($6,640).

Amanda Stevenson, Katie Genadek, Stefanie Mollborn, Sara Yeatman, and Jane Menken: “Assessing the Life Course Impacts of Access to Highly Effective Contraception Using Linked Records.” ($2,381).

Fernando Riosmena and Megan Reynolds (U. of Utah): “Hispanic Health in an Era of Rising Immigration Enforcement and Anti-Immigrant Sentiment.” ($12,477).

View projects supported in previous years.

Institute of Behavioral Science pilot grants:

Rick Mansfield and Jeronimo Carballo’s “The Skill and Spatial Incidence of Changing Patterns of U.S. International Trade among American Workers.” ($12,687).

Adrian Shin. “War, Elite Competition, and Economic Globalization.” ($13,388).

Other CU-wide grants:

Hunter receives CU Research and Innovation (RIO) Seed Grant to examine implications of different techniques to anonymize demographic data in South Africa DSS through geographic masking.

CUPC Director Lori Hunter received a CU Boulder Research and Innovation Office Seed Grant for her project “Socio-Environmental Data Integration for Population-Environment-Health Research: A South African Illustration.” This project, directly connected to CU Boulder’s Grand Challenge and in collaboration with Dr. Wayne Twine of the University of the Witwatersrand (South Africa) uses data from the Agincourt Health and Demographic Surveillance System to examine the implications of different techniques to anonymize demographic data through geographic masking. The aim is to identify appropriate masking techniques allowing for less costly development of — and easier access to — the geographic coding necessary for facilitate population-environment research.