Through this initiative, CREATE seeks to advance knowledge about race, disability, and technology. We thank the Paul G. Allen School of Computer Science & Engineering, the Population Health Initiative, the Simpson Center for the Humanities, the Buerk Center for Entrepreneurship, the Office of the ADA Coordinator, and the Race & Equity Initiative for their contributions to this initiative.

CREATE-sponsored seminars and events have highlighted scholarship and research about race, disability, and technology. Some examples include:

• Cross-campus seminar on Race, Disability and Technology, Fall 2021
• Featured panel discussion at CREATE’s Spring 2022 Community Day
• Discussion of Alice Wong’s Year of the Tiger: An Activist’s Life, CREATE Seminar, Fall 2023
• The Fall 2024 CREATE Accessibility Seminar includes discussions of Black, crip, and LGBTQIA+ studies of access and intersectionality

Our goal is to move these conversations forward by funding research about race, disability, and technology. We envision projects that deeply engage with this intersection through a Disability Justice and/or DisCrit lens, that explore how race and disability together impact the experiences, outcomes, technology needs, and opportunities available to people of color with disabilities. Starting in Fall 2024: to broaden our support for intersectional research, projects that also address such topics as heteronormativity and/or are inclusive of LGBTQIA+ perspectives will be given special consideration. 

A 2023 case study, Working at the Intersection of Race, Disability, and Accessibility, includes a framework for research at this intersection and may be helpful in guiding your submission.

Eligibility

• Full-time or part-time faculty with regular or fixed-term appointments are eligible to apply as PI or Co-PI, as are professional staff. All applicants must have PI status as determined by their dean. Applicants must hold an eligible rank that is active on the UW Workday system at the time of submission. Those with acting, temporary, affiliate, visiting, or postdoctoral appointments are ineligible to apply as PI or Co-PI, but may be included in the budget for the project team. Affiliate or visiting faculty may not receive salary, but can be involved on the project team, just not as PI/Co-PI.
• To qualify for a Tier II grant, the team must include stakeholder representation on the planning team (and ensure they are receiving appropriate compensation for their involvement in the project); Tier II applicants are also strongly encouraged to have faculty from two different disciplines on the project team. 
• This proposal may not be used as matching funds for another grant; similarly, support will not be provided merely to supplement or extend an ongoing funded research project.
• Priority will be given to PIs who participate in CREATE events in the area of Race, Disability and Technology.
• Priority will also be given to PIs who are not already receiving CREATE funds for the current academic year. A PI or Co-PI may submit only one proposal per academic year.

Reporting requirements

• Any significant changes must be approved by CREATE leadership.
• Any papers, posters, videos, etc. published from work supported by this funding, whatever the amount used, must acknowledge CREATE with the following: “This work was supported in part by the University of Washington Center for Research and Education on Accessible Technology and Experiences (CREATE), the Paul G. Allen School of Computer Science & Engineering, the Population Health Initiative, and the Race & Equity Initiative at the University of Washington.”
• Any students heavily involved in the work are expected to become an active CREATE member (e.g., join our mailing list and Slack community and attend events and seminars, etc.).
• Recipients are expected to participate in Community Day/Research Showcase.
• Recipients are expected to submit a short, written summary of how the funds were spent a year after receiving the funding or with their next proposal submission, whichever comes first. Faculty agree to allow CREATE to use this information in fundraising, presentations, and promotional efforts. The report should include the following:
  • A short paragraph describing: (a) the problem addressed or opportunity pursued, (b) the results achieved (including any publications), (c) how the funding was helpful, (d) information about any further funding submitted or received as a result of this work, and (e) information about translation successes (e.g., blog posts, patents, productization, adoption by others, community engagements, etc.).
  • A description of stakeholder engagement in the project.
  • A list of students supported by prior disbursements and whether those students are CREATE members, along with contact information so we can ensure they get on CREATE mailing lists.
  • A list of other faculty involved in the project/s, if any.

Deadlines and funding

We accept two tiers of submissions.

Tier I proposals

Proposals for up to $15,000 can be used to support pilot research and capacity building efforts to develop leadership of relevant people/organizations.

Next Tier I proposal due dates: February 3, 2025, by 5:00 p.m.

Tier II proposals

Proposals for up to $35,000 (plus community support) must have strong stakeholder representation. Higher funding amounts are available to support a partner organization if the proposal is engaging with a stakeholder organization (for a total of available for funding per proposal). Awards are based on the readiness and quality of what is submitted. 

Next Tier II proposal due dates:

• Letters of Intent are due January 6, 2025, by 5:00 p.m.
• If invited for a full proposal, these will be due on February 3, 2025, by 5:00 p.m.
• Awards will be announced by March 3, 2025.

Submit your proposal by email

Proposal review process

Proposals are reviewed by a committee that may solicit reviews from other UW faculty peers who provide comments and evaluate them based on explicit written criteria. Proposals that score highly may also be sent out to the community for review. Review criteria include:

• The merit of the proposal in terms of research merit, potential for impact on people of color with disabilities, and value of the technology component.
• Likelihood of success of the proposal to further our understanding of disability, race and technology.
• Available opportunities and timeliness of the proposal for obtaining subsequent funding.
• Team membership: Does the proposal have a team with expertise in race, disability and technology? How strong and suitable are the qualifications of the project personnel? How strong are their records of success, especially in the case of more established researchers? Is the team interdisciplinary, reflecting the interdisciplinary nature of the topic?
• Stakeholder representation (i.e. people of color with disabilities and/or organizations that represent or work with them): For Tier I proposals: How strong is the plan to connect with stakeholders and work with them to define a larger research agenda? For Tier II proposals: Is there substantive stakeholder organization involvement on the planning team and in the definition and execution of the proposed work, or equivalent involvement of stakeholders (as opposed to a convenience sample, survey, or other surface level engagement, or engagement that is not intersectional in nature)? Is the work synergistic with theoretical framings already being laid out by people of color with disabilities such as Disability Justice, DisCrit, and/or crip-of-color critique?
• Feasibility/appropriateness of the project itself, its timeline, and its budget.

Application instructions 

Formatting

Proposals must follow the following standards:

• Submitted as a single accessible PDF or Word file (you can download a Google doc as a Word file). See UW IT’s guidance on making documents accessible.
• Set paper size to A4 or 8.5×11″ paper with .5” margins.
• Use 11 pt. font, single-spaced. Smaller text in figures, graphs, diagrams and charts is acceptable, as long as it is legible when the page is viewed at 100%.
• A specific citation format is not required.

Tier I proposal requirements

Tier I proposals should be limited to 1 page (plus references, images and supplemental documents, as specified below, which are the same for both tiers). The goal of Tier I proposals, of up to $15,000, is to support pilot research and capacity building efforts with stakeholders’ organizations. The one-page proposal should include:

1. Title of the proposed project
2. Project team members (keep this brief; you’ll provide more details in your supplemental materials)
3. Stakeholder organization you will work with (or plan for developing that connection)
4. Pilot research/capacity building plan
5. Timeline (6-8 months from the time of funding is expected)

Tier II proposal requirements

The goal of Tier II proposals, which must have stakeholder organization representation in the problem definition (or other strong stakeholder representation), is to conduct significant, publishable, stakeholder-informed research at the intersection of race, disability and technology. 

Tier II proposals require a letter of intent before they are invited for submission. When they are invited, you should submit the main proposal and supplemental documents as specified below. 

Letter of intent

Each letter of intent must contain the following sections:

1. Title of the proposed project.
2. Approximate budget request.
3. Names, titles, email addresses, and organizational affiliation for each member of the project team. More team members can be added at a later date if you are invited to submit a full application.
4. Overview of proposed research plan (500 word maximum).

Note: you must have already engaged stakeholders at the planning level at the time of submission of a letter of intent if you are planning to apply for a Tier II Proposal.

Main proposal

Your proposal should include the following parts:

• Cover Page (1 page) – Title, name and department of PIs, proposal abstract, and plan for informing proposed work from stakeholder representatives (250 words)

• Proposed Work (up to 2 pages) – What is the topic you will address, why is it important; and what will you do about it? What will the project deliver that will positively impact people of color with disabilities? How will you evaluate these deliverables? 

• Expected Impact on People with Disabilities (½ page) – How will this project ensure representation of people of color with disabilities in the work? How will it contribute to disability advocacy, disability rights, disability justice, and/or disability communities? 

• Ethics And Broader Impact Plans (up to 1 page) – Provide a Disability Justice– and/or DisCrit-based analysis of the proposed work to show its relevance to the research being done by and for people of color with disabilities. Also address any potential ethical concerns, if relevant. If there is legitimate and foreseeable harm possible, how will you address it? Also describe how the proposal team will ensure broader impact of the research in stakeholder communities. 
• Project Workplan and Timeline (½ page) – What is the expected work plan for this project? Work should take place over 9-18 months. The work plan should Include key activities and their expected durations. A Gantt chart is encouraged but not required.

Supplemental documents

Both Tier I and Tier II proposals should include:

• Project budget and brief justification (up to 1 page) – What is the total amount being sought (up to $15,000 for Tier I and up to $35,000 for Tier II), and how does it break down by major activity or category? Include a budget table and brief budget justification including time to spend on the work by key personnel. Note that budgets should realistically reflect the costs of pursuing the work. Budgets that seem inflated will not be judged favorably. The budget table should include:

• Salaries and Wages (including benefits)
• User study fees and contractual services
• Travel if necessary for stakeholder interaction (i.e., not conference travel)
• Supplies and equipment
• Tuition

Neither indirect costs nor alcohol will be allowed. 

For Tier II proposals, an extra $15,000 is available specifically to compensate community partners if there is a true bidirectional relationship in place, as demonstrated by a letter of support. Otherwise, the limit is $35,000.

References (no page limit) 

Attach a list of references at the end. References do not count in your submission’s page length.

Project team

A 1-page description of the project team. Does the proposal have a team with expertise in race, disability and technology? Have they engaged with CREATE programming on this topic? How will they collaborate? What existing support do they have for this work (e.g., it is ongoing; closely related funding (and how it differs); etc.)?

Attachments: In addition, append a 1- to 2-page CV, resume, or biosketch for each PI or person requesting salary and a current and pending document for each PI. 

Suggested reviewers

If you would like to suggest reviewers, you may.

Submit your proposal by email

Questions?

Send any questions about this grant to create-contact@uw.edu.