Food and Agricultural Sciences National Needs Graduate and Postgraduate Fellowship Grants Program (NNF) Project Directors Conference
Each year, the NNF program holds a conference for program project directors. Objectives span exchange of award administration information and guidance for new awardees in conducting projects, to showcasing progress on funded projects in oral and/or poster sessions. In 2008 and 2009, these meetings will coincide with the annual North American Colleges and Teachers of Agriculture (NACTA) conference. The 2008 meeting will be held June 10-13 at Utah State University. The NACTA Web site has a Call for Abstracts.
Past Conferences
2007
In 2007, the NNF project directors conference was held jointly with the Higher Education Multicultural Scholars Grants Program (MSP), on October 16-17, at Waterfront Centre, Washington, DC. Among the 75 attendees were 45 project directors or program administrators; 20 students; and10 invited speakers from academia, private sector other USDA agencies.
Meeting goals were to:
promote networking and scientific/training/workforce opportunities information exchange through exchanging information, accomplishments and progress made on NNF and MSP grants;
improve understanding of the CSREES grant review process to facilitate preparing complete proposal packages;
develop rapport with the CSREES staff responsible for grants reviews and approvals to strengthen communications;
Discuss congressional mandates related to the timely completion of projects and the reporting tools associated with this process;
improve the CSREES post-award management of competitive grants and the federal management of these awards, and;
make available information that will challenge all to attain excellence.
The event’s plenary and invited presentations were as follows:
