Enclosure 

NASA Advisory Council Recommendation

Building Research Capabilities and Infrastructure

at Minority Serving Institutions

2002-01-06

Name of Committee: STEM Engagement Committee 

Chair of Committee: Mr. Daniel Dumbacher

Date of Council Public Deliberation: March 1, 2022

Short Title of Recommendation: Building Research Capabilities 

and Infrastructure at Minority 

Serving Institutions

Recommendation:

The Council recommends that the NASA Administrator and NASA Mission Directorates, 

along with the NASA Office of Procurement, should ensure that NASA assists building 

research capabilities and infrastructure at Minority Serving Institutions (MSIs).

Major Reasons for the Recommendation:

This will enable MSIs to be competitive and successful in contributing to NASA’s work and 

help build a strong K-12 pipeline of interest and engagement.

Consequences of No Action on the Recommendation:

Lack of coordination impedes NASA’s capability to build a diverse workforce for the future.

NASA Response:

NASA concurs with the recommendation to assist building research capabilities and 

infrastructure at MSIs. In FY 2021, the Office of STEM Engagement (OSTEM) provided 34 

new awards to MSIs (in direct collaboration and alignment with the Mission Directorates)

through awards such as: the Minority University Research and Education Program 

(MUREP) Institutional Research Opportunity; MUREP Innovation and Tech Transfer Idea 

Competition; MUREP Aerospace High Volume Manufacturing and Supply Chain; and 

MUREP Partnering to Advance Capacity and Technology. OSTEM also issued six new 

MUREP INCLUDES awards with a focus on broadening participation in engineering and

awarded $6.6M to ten MSIs in partnership with the Science Mission Directorate (SMD) 

through MUREP Ocean Biology and Biogeochemistry (OCEAN) awards to build capacity 

for MSIs to participate in NASA’s SMD Earth Science research opportunities.

Additionally, the Aeronautics Research Mission Directorate’s (ARMD) University 

Leadership Initiative (ULI) provides the opportunity for university teams to exercise 
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technical and organizational leadership in proposing unique technical challenges, defining 

interdisciplinary solutions, and applying innovative teaming strategies that include teaming 

with MSIs to strengthen the research impact. In five rounds over the past few years, ULI has 

awarded $157M to multiple university teams. Of the 66 universities, 23 of them are MSIs –

nine of which are Historically Black Colleges and Universities. Nearly 35 percent of all 

participating universities in ULI are MSIs. Many of these MSIs are first-time awardees or 

sub-awardees from ARMD, thereby increasing the aeronautics research ecosystem in the 

United States. NASA ARMD also supports the University Students Research Challenge 

(USRC). USRC seeks to develop novel concepts with the potential to create new capabilities 

in aeronautics by stimulating aeronautics research in the United States student community. 

In four rounds, USRC has funded 19 student teams from various universities of whom five

are MSI student teams, about 26 percent of the total.

 

As recommended by both the NASA Advisory Council (NAC) and a recent National 

Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine report, Advancing Diversity, Equity, 

Inclusion and Accessibility in the Leadership of Competed Space Missions, OSTEM will 

continue to coordinate efforts with NASA’s SMD to enable MSIs to be competitive and 

successful in contributing to NASA’s work. Furthermore, OSTEM has efforts to evaluate 

investments in university research capabilities and infrastructure, particularly as they support 

efforts to build a diverse future science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM)

workforce. OSTEM will provide a report to the NAC STEM Engagement Committee 

regarding the study’s findings.