Through a new Request for Information (RFI), NIAID seeks input on potential approaches to advance DEIA, ensuring that all available perspectives are considered as the Institute develops and implements DEIA strategies.
Through the RFI, NIAID invites information and recommendations to enhance DEIA across the Institute’s funded activities. NIAID is interested in comments from stakeholders throughout the scientific research, advocacy, clinical practice, and non-scientific communities, including the general public.
NIAID is particularly interested in comments from the following:
- Higher education administrators
- Undergraduate and graduate students
- Postdoctoral scientists
- Biomedical faculty (especially early-stage)
- Community partners
- Academic institutions (especially Historically Black Colleges and Universities, Hispanic-Serving Institutions, Tribal Colleges and Universities)
- Other institutions that have a historical commitment to educating students from underrepresented groups, including those identified in the Notice of NIH’s Interest in Diversity
- Organizations that focus on racial or ethnic equity and the development of strategies to enhance DEIA within the scientific workforce and advance health disparities research
NIAID seeks comments on the following topics. A few examples are provided below; see the RFI for complete details.
NIAID Research Areas
Identify or provide recommendations on strategies to:
- Address health equity as related to the NIAID mission.
- Target populations and/or disease areas with differences in incidence of infection and disease.
- Mitigate implicit bias in the recruitment and inclusion of women and underrepresented populations, and individuals across the lifespan as participants in research to prevent infectious, immunologic, and allergic diseases.
NIAID Organizational Practices
Identify or provide recommendations on strategies to:
- Address any systematic and structural barriers to receiving NIAID research funding that may exist.
- Address any conscious or unconscious biases that may exist in the NIH peer review process.
- Identify means to promote more equitable communication.
- Gather and report DEIA data that are of interest to the extramural community, including areas of health disparities, minority health, and health equity research as well as scientific workforce diversity.
- Identify best practices to limit any accessibility barriers that may exist.
Extramural Scientific Workforce Diversity
Identify or provide recommendations on strategies to:
- Identify gaps and barriers to developing, diversifying, and sustaining a diverse extramural scientific workforce and building a scientific pipeline to support the NIAID mission.
- Enhance the development of a highly competent, diverse scientific research workforce, including those identified as underrepresented (NOT-OD-20-031), across all areas within NIAID's mission.
- Attract, retain, and foster diversity among trainees.
Submitting a Response
Submit comments through the RFI Submission Website by March 31, 2023.