January 2020 – The Office of Research in the College of Nursing at UMass Amherst

Moving Massachusetts Upstream (MassUP) $2M Investment Program

The Massachusetts Health Policy Commission (HPC) has issued a Request for Proposals (RFP) seeking partnerships between provider and community-based organizations looking to address upstream social, economic, and environmental barriers to health as part of the ‘Moving Massachusetts Upstream’ (MassUP) initiative. The MassUP initiative is a collaboration among Massachusetts state agencies. The vision of the partnership is better health, lower costs, and reduced health inequities across communities and populations in Massachusetts through effective collaboration among government, health care systems, and local organizations.

Proposals for the MassUP investment program must (1) describe a social determinant of health (SDOH) that is related to poor health and health inequity for individuals in a geographic community; and (2) propose a program through which the eligible applicant and their partners will undertake activities to address the SDOH in that community. The MassUP investment program is making $2 million available through this RFP, funding three to four awards of up to $650,000 each. The RFP and its attachments are available on the state’s procurement website, COMMBUYS, located here. Please check COMMBUYS regularly for RFP amendments, FAQs, and other information that the HPC may issue during the procurement period. Responses to the RFP must be submitted to the HPC by 3:00 PM on Friday, February 21, 2020.

Please submit all questions about the MassUP RFP to HPC-Innovation@mass.gov by 3:00 PM on February 7, 2020.

College of Nursing Spring 2020 Seminar Series: Dr. Em Rabelais

Speaker: Dr. Em Rabelais

Date: Tuesday, February 11, 12:00pm-1:00pm

Location: UMass Amherst Institute of Applied Life Sciences Conference Center (Life Sciences Laboratories Room S330)

The Office of Research in the College of Nursing is pleased to present the first talk in its 2020 Spring Seminar Series by Dr. Em Rabelais, an academic health ethicist, health humanities scholar and an Assistant Professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago College of Nursing.

Dr. Rabelais will discuss “Listening outside of whiteness: Make our bodies matter”. Health professions and research educators attained their position(alities) only through complying with whiteness; as such, how can they/we confront the concept of whiteness-in-us that promotes a specific transmission and prioritization of knowledge and knowledge’s sources?

Click here for further details.

UMass Amherst: Building Equitable Collaboration Networks

Speaker: Julia Melkers, Georgia Institute of Technology.
Date: Monday Feb 3, 12:30-2 PM
Location: LSL S330-340

While scientists conduct their work in collaborative teams both, locally, nationally, and globally, participation in teams is not necessarily diverse. In some disciplines where women and people of color are severely underrepresented, opportunities to collaboratively engage may experience additional challenges. This workshop builds on existing empirical work to address how academic faculty can more deliberately construct and meaningfully collaborate in ways that are more inclusive and equitable.

Cosponsored by the UMass Amherst ADVANCE program, Institute for Social Science Research, and Office of Faculty Development. Lunch included; registration required, available here.

ENRS 2020 Scientific Sessions: Registration Now Open

Registration is now open for the 32nd Annual Scientific Sessions of the Eastern Nursing Research Society, “The Revolutionary Power of Nursing Science: Healthy Equity, Policy, and Practice” in Boston, MA from March 26-27, 2020.

You can view the preliminary conference brochure here and can register for the conference here.

Summer Genetics Institute 20th Anniversary Symposium

NINR’s Division of Intramural Research (DIR) will convene a half-day symposium to mark a milestone anniversary of its Summer Genetics Institute. “The 20th Anniversary of the Summer Genetics Institute” will be held June 22, 2020 in the Natcher Conference Center on the NIH campus, in Bethesda, Maryland.

The symposium will include keynote addresses, scientific presentations, a scientific panel discussion, and a research poster session. It will highlight SGI graduates’ many accomplishments and showcase the positive impact of this program in accelerating genetics and genomics in nursing science. This event is free of charge, but registration is required.

The Summer Genetics Institute celebrates 20 years of providing nurse scientists with a foundation in molecular genetics appropriate for use in research and clinical practice. Nearly 450 SGI graduates are making a difference in communities across the country — building programs of nursing research in genetics, disseminating the results of genetics-related research in peer-reviewed scientific publications and at scientific conferences, and integrating genetics content in nursing school curricula and nursing practice.

The symposium will be broadcast live and archived at: http://videocast.nih.gov. Visit https://www.ninr.nih.gov/newsandinformation/events/sgi-20 for more event details as they become available.

2020 NINR Director’s Lecture – Dr. Randy A. Jones

On March 5, Dr. Randy A. Jones will present “Complex Decision Making in Prostate Cancer,” from 11:00 a.m. to 12:00 noon in Lipsett Amphitheater in the Clinical Center (Building 10) on the NIH Campus in Bethesda, Maryland.

This lecture will also be broadcast live and archived at: http://videocast.nih.gov.

Randy A. Jones, PhD, RN, FAAN is a Professor at the University of Virginia School of Nursing.

Dr. Jones’ research and publications focus on health disparities, prostate cancer, chronic illness, end-of-life care, and decision-making. He has received funding from organizations such as the National Institutes of Health, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF), American Cancer Society, and the American Nurses Foundation. He is currently a principal investigator on an NINR-funded study focusing on treatment decision-making among patients with advanced prostate cancer.

Dr. Jones is a fellow in the American Academy of Nursing (AAN), a RWJF Nurse Faculty Scholar Alumnus, and a National Advisory Committee member for RWJF Clinical Scholars and AAN’s Institute for Nursing Leadership.

Dr. Jones is committed in promoting research, evidence-based practice, health policy, and enhancing higher education and clinical practice.