Academic, outreach faculty team up on rural issues
Eight individual or teams of University of Georgia academic faculty members were awarded seed grants to conduct research in rural communities alongside faculty from UGA’s Public Service and Outreach and Cooperative Extension.
Those awarded grants in the College of Education include:
- TJ Kopcha, an associate professor in the Department of Career and Information Studies, who will study Creating the Healthiest Georgia with faculty from the Archway Partnership
- Jamon Flowers, a clinical assistant professor in the Department of Lifelong Education, Administration, and Policy, and Georgia Hodges, an associate research professor in the Department of Mathematics, Science, and Social Studies Education, who will study Rural Communities and Schools Collaboration on STEM with faculty from the Archway Partnership
These faculty members were among 20 that attended the inaugural Rural Engagement Faculty Workshop, which kicked off its first of four sessions in January.
The goal of the workshop was to encourage academic faculty to identify a challenging issue in rural Georgia and find UGA outreach faculty members to partner with on solutions to that challenge. Through a competitive process, participants were eligible to apply for $5,000 seed grants funded by the Provost’s Office to support initial research that can be used to apply for external funding.