2025-2026 EGRA Competition is now open
The competition will close on October 19, 2025
Purpose
The Graduate School is providing small grant awards to support research, creative or artistic projects. This program underscores the value placed on providing students with research opportunities and support for the scholarly work of graduate students and its dissemination.
Funds Available
Proposals will be evaluated by a committee assembled by the Dean of the Graduate School composed of members of the Graduate Council. One of the committee’s goals is to distribute awards to students with quality projects representing a wide variety of University departments. Funds will be provided to graduate students to participate in original research, creative, or artistic projects in which they have major responsibility.
Award Amounts:
- Individual student proposals chosen for support will each receive an award up to $2,000.
- Groups of up to three URI students may submit a proposal. If a Group Proposal is chosen for support, it will receive an award of up to $3,000.
What Funds May be Used for:
Funds may be used to support travel to national, regional or international conferences (including registration fees for in-person or virtual conferences), to purchase items for specific projects, to defray publication costs, or for specific needs that the committee deems essential for a student’s development. Cost-sharing by departments and faculty sponsors is encouraged.
Reimbursements will not be provided for budgets that have occurred prior to the awarding period.
All EGRA projects require supervision by a faculty sponsor.
Questions about this program should be directed to Cara Mitnick, Director of Professional and Community Development, at cmitnick@uri.edu, referencing the subject line “EGRA and last name.”
How to apply
To apply for a grant, a student must submit the items listed below. Detailed instructions for drafting and submitting each of these items are found by clicking on the “Apply” button in the upper right corner of this EGRA InfoReady application page.
- Project Budget: (Use one of the templates below)
- Project Description (no more than 3 pages excluding references)
- 2-3 page CV or Resume
- Evidence of IRB/IACUC Approval (if applicable)
- Faculty Sponsor’s Faculty Support Form
- Applicants will indicate the Faculty Sponsor’s email. Upon submitting your application, your Faculty Sponsor will receive an email containing a unique link to upload the form.
Below are the rubrics used to score EGRA proposals:
Conduct Research Rubric
Disseminate Research Rubric
2025-2026 Application deadline is Sunday, October 19th.
Faculty Support Form due by Monday, October 20th.
Conditions
The awards have certain limitations:
- A graduate student, whether individually or as part of a Group Proposal, can receive only one EGRA grant in an academic year
- Funds may be used only to support projects which include original student research, creative, or artistic endeavors
- IRB or IACUC approval must be obtained before the start of the project, if applicable
- Use of these funds for incentives for research participation is strongly discouraged
- Students who received ERGA grants last year may apply again, however, preference will be given to those who have not received these awards previously.
Processing EGRA Award Funds
Award decisions will be announced by December 5, 2025. Expenditure and reimbursement process begins December 5, 2025. All funds must be expended and travel completed by November 30, 2026. Any funds remaining will not rollover and we cannot provide an extension.
Instructions on how to process the award will be included in the award letter.
Questions about this program should be directed to Cara Mitnick, Director of Professional and Community Development, at cmitnick@uri.edu, referencing in the subject line “EGRA and last name.”
Deadlines to submit copies of travel and purchasing documentation:
- Expenses and travel conducted during December 5, 2025 – June 25, 2026 are due no later than by June 30, 2026.
- Expenses and travel conducted during July 1, 2026 – November 30, 2026 are due no later than by December 4, 2026.
2025 EGRA Awardees
Congratulations to the following award recipients!
Awardees | Application Title | College |
Masoud Abdi | Stability and anomalous aggregation in suspensions of polymer-grafted nanoparticles | College of Engineering |
Patrick Bailey | The Old Pup and the Sea: Evaluating Aquatic Resource Use in Gray Wolves | College of the Environment and Life Sciences |
Theint Thandar Bol | Safe Passages: Understanding How Rhode Island’s Wildlife Uses Roadway Crossings | College of the Environment and Life Sciences |
Madison Geraci | Building Single-Cell Based Morphological and Barcoding Datasets of Benthic Foraminifera | College of the Environment and Life Sciences |
Molly Hardwick | Microbiome Editing Gordon Research Conference (GRC) Attendance | College of the Environment and Life Sciences |
Christopher Hickling | Shared Landscapes: Human Disturbance and Bobcat Space Use | College of the Environment and Life Sciences |
Md Iftakhar Khan | Shape separation of microplastics in simulated seawater through inertial microfluidics | College of Engineering |
Aubrey Laity | Enhancing Multi-Messenger Astrophysics via On-Site LIGO Detector Work | College of Arts and Sciences |
Melissa Lodge | Revisiting REDs Screening: Updated Insights on the LEAF-Q and EDE-Q in Collegiate Female Athletes | College of Health Sciences |
Frankie Lopez | Assessing Phytoplankton Growth Across Size Classes under Alkalinity Enhancement in the Gulf of Maine | Graduate School of Oceanography |
Morgan Nathan | Expanding Access to Gravitational Wave Science: Reorganizing LIGO Educational Resources and Developing a K-12 Pilot Program in Rhode Island | College of Arts and Sciences |
Maja Nielsen | College of Arts and Sciencescading impacts of blue crab functional traits on ribbed mussel phenotypes and salt marsh mutlifunctionality | College of the Environment and Life Sciences |
Maryam Norouzi | Learning-Based Cooperative Control of AUV Teams for Underwater Mining with Complete Dynamic Uncertainty | College of Engineering |
Alberto Paz | Validation of a Machine Learning-Based Genotyping Approach in Hard Shell Clams Affected by Transmissible Cancer | College of the Environment and Life Sciences |
Jordan Scott | Ink Under Siege: Writing for Queer & Trans Teens in the Era of Book Bans | College of Arts and Sciences |
Theresa Sierra | Measurement of Renal Drug-Metabolizing Enzymes and Transporters in a Population with Nonalcoholic Fatty Liver Disease | College of Pharmacy |
Suparna Veeturi | Samya: A Jewelry-like Wrist Wearable for Managing Stress in Women with Polycystic Ovary Syndrome | College of Engineering |
Jingmei Zeng | Training in Mice Milk Collection Through International Collaboration in Spain | College of Pharmacy |
