Forging Partnerships

Extramural funding for Policy School research continued From 2017 to 2023, the number of faculty submitting grant proposals increased by 70 percent The amount raised increased by more than 700 percent (from $431K to almost $3.5 million).

In 2023, the Policy School raised almost $30K for student support and, on Northeastern Giving Day 2023, mobilized the largest number of contributors of any unit in the College of Social Sciences and Humanities.

National Science Foundation: Mobility Data for Communities Boston Area Research Initiative

Cell phone location records, called mobility data (MD), are data about where people go These data are an essential resource to study how people move and interact in society However, these data are also very complex, so very few scientists have the technical skills to work with them. Alongside MIT Connection Science, BARI received a $1 million grant to support the creation of Mobility Data for Communities (MD4C), an infrastructure project that converts MD into a series of useful measures that describe mobility across a region's neighborhoods and places within those neighborhoods. These measures are accessible to everyone, including researchers, policymakers, and practitioners.

Alfred P. Sloan Foundation: Energy Justice Transformation After Crisis—Lessons from Puerto Rico

Laura Kuhl

Professor Kuhl received a grant from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation to support a comparative community-engaged project that will examine the power dynamics that surround disruptions, recovery, and the related implications for equitable energy transformation in Puerto Rico, West Virginia, and Massachusetts – three regions with different energy systems and disparate political contexts

The research team will work with community partners to ensure that marginalized voices that are often left out of discussions of energy transformation are elevated. The research design will center community perspectives on energy transformation in their community.

The United States Agency for International Development: Empowering Caribbean Communities Against Climate Change

Rebecca Riccio and Moira Zellner

With the help of a $1 million federal grant from USAID, Northeastern University is partnering with three communities in Barbados and Dominica over the next two years to develop resilience plans to adapt to climate change and extreme weather events The team's effort centers around community-led initiatives to properly identify and prioritize the various needs communities face, and assess and creatively build on their own capacities.

This grant, awarded to Stephen Flynn, Director of the Global Resilient Institute, and Policy School professors Rebecca Riccio, Director of the Social Impact Lab, and Moira Zellner, Director of Participatory Modeling and Data Science and Co-Director of the NULab, is in collaboration with University of West Indies and University of Hawai'i

National Endowment for the Arts: Northeastern Public Evaluation Lab

Emily Mann

Policy School Professor Emily Mann is working with Northeastern Public Evaluation Lab (NU-PEL), an interdisciplinary lab conducting evaluation research on successful and unsuccessful aspects of community programs in order to promote healthier communities and enhance residents' lives. Alongside Northeastern NuLawLab, NU-PEL was the recipient of a newly awarded grant by The National Endowment for the Arts.

The East Boston Spatial Justice Lab will work with Maverick Landing Community Services and local artists Gabriela Cartagena, communications co-director at City Life Vida Urbana, and Anthony Romero, professor of the practice at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts at Tufts University In addition to the School of Law’s NuLawLab, the Northeastern University project leadership includes co-principal investigators Dr. Tiana Yom of NU-PEL and Dr. Miso Kim of Northeastern’s College of Arts, Media and Design.