New program to recognize and reward early career faculty with outstanding promise for scholarly achievement and impact in STEM or STEM education.

The program, entitled the Goodnight Early Career Innovator Awards Program, will identify twenty-five (25) tenure-track assistant professors as Goodnight Early Career Innovators each year for the next three years. Selected faculty will receive $22,000 each year for 3 years for scholarship-related spending.

In this first year of the program, we will conduct an expedited process such that selected faculty can access award funds at the start of the new fiscal year, July 1, 2021.

Each participating college should begin work immediately to select a committee of full professors, preferably professors of distinction, that will vet college nominees and determine which ones will move forward for university-level review. Each participating college has a nomination cap, based on tenure-track assistant professor FTEs, as follows:

Agriculture and Life Sciences – 12
Education – 2
Engineering – 10
Natural Resources – 2
Sciences – 7
Textiles – 2
Veterinary Medicine – 6

College nominations are due March 19, 2021. Goodnight Early Career Innovators Award Program details, including eligibility and selection criteria are available on the provost’s website.

Eligibility

Nominees must be from a participating college and tenure-track assistant professors at the time of application. Their scholarship must be clearly and substantively contributing to innovations and advancement in STEM or STEM education. No faculty member may be selected as a recipient more than once.

Selection Criteria

Nominees should show outstanding promise for future achievement and impact in STEM and STEM education. A strong nominee will have demonstrated superior scholarly achievement at an early career stage and will have a rigorous research agenda that speaks to the candidate’s potential to advance knowledge in STEM or STEM education. Evidence of early productivity in research and innovation may include a strong early record of scholarly publication or dissemination appropriate to the discipline (including co-authorship with leaders in their field, external funding, or recognition as an early career leader in their field (e.g. NSF or NIH pre- and post-doctoral awards).

Nomination Materials

●Current CV and SFR (maximum 25 pages total)
●Letter of nomination from the nominee’s department head addressing the nominee’s qualifications and potential for future achievement and impact in STEM or STEM education (maximum 2 pages)
●Letter from the dean supporting the nomination at the university level and the nominee’s potential for research leadership in the college (maximum 2 pages)

Submission Process

Please submit all nomination documents within two (2) PDF files.
●PDF File 1 should contain the current CV and SFR
●PDF File 2 should contain the letter of nomination and the letter of support (two pages per letter)●Submit both PDF files as email attachments or upload to Google Drive
●Email subject line: GECI 2021 NOMINATION, college acronym, nominee last name (Example: GECI 2021 NOMINATION, CALS, Jones).

Submit materials to Judy Austin, events and awards coordinator, at jcaustin@ncsu.edu. Please contact Ms. Austin if you have any questions or concerns regarding submissions.

Selection Process

For this academic year’s expedited process, an advisory committee of senior leaders in my office and Vice Chancellor for Research and Innovation Mladen Vouk will review the nominations and make recommendations to me and to the chancellor, who will make the final decision on awardees

Timeline

●March 19, 2021: Nominations from participating colleges due to the Provost’s Office
●March 26 through April 15, 2021: Nominations reviewed by advisory committee
●April 26, 2021: Advisory committee recommendations for award recipients due to the provost
●Week of May 3, 2021: 2021-22 Goodnight Early Career Innovator Awards announcement
●July 1, 2021: Funds available for 2021-22 Goodnight Early Career Innovators.

If you have questions about the nomination procedures or timeline, please contact Judy Austin at jcaustin@ncsu.edu.