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Closing the Gap

About Closing the Gap Summit Awards

Part of Massey’s strategic Summit meetings, the Closing the Gap Summit Award is designed to promote catchment area, community-engaged and cancer disparities-relevant research with an emphasis on Massey’s four disease priority areas – breast, lung, gastrointestinal (GI) and prostate cancers. Summit meetings will be held throughout the year, each with an emphasis on one of the four priority cancers. Summit attendees are eligible to submit a letter of intent (LOI) for pilot project funding within a month of the Summit meeting. Two to three letters of intent will be invited to submit a full application following each Summit meeting.

  • April 19, 2022: Breast Cancer Summit
  • November 2, 2022: Lung Cancer Summit
  • TBD: GI Cancers Summit
  • TBD: Prostate Cancer Summit

Award details

  • Up to $75,000 will be awarded following each of the four planned Summits
  • All VCU faculty and trainees who participated in the summit associated with the award are invited to submit
  • Proposals should comprise a multi-principal investigator team, including at least two investigators (either an interdisciplinary dyad or a senior/junior dyad and one Community Champion), however teams can be larger
  • At least one Community Champion must be included in the development of the project. Please contact Dr. Maria Thomson at cancerchamps@vcu.edu to discuss engagement of a Community Champion in your proposal.
  • Team leads should be from different disciplines/perspectives/expertise
  • A Massey investigator may only hold one active pilot research award at a time

LOI requirements

  • LOIs are due within 30 days of the most recent Summit
  • LOIs should include the name, department, role, mentor, concept title and a 250-word project description
  • LOIs should be submitted to Alex Haynes at haynesa4@vcu.edu

Upcoming deadlines and award dates

Stay tuned for more details about the upcoming GI Cancers Summit in 2023. For questions, please contact Alex Haynes at haynesa4@vcu.edu or (305) 915-4200.

Previous awardees