As part of fostering a strong, robust, and diverse biomedical research workforce, NIH must engage scientists from various backgrounds and lived experiences to solve complex issues facing public health, including researchers with disabilities. This NIH All About Grants podcast episode discusses particular challenges these researchers may experience and how NIH is working to address them.
Drs. Alison Cernich, Deputy Director of the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) and Theresa Cruz, Director of the NICHD National Center for Medical Rehabilitation Research, join us for this conversation. They discuss civil rights protections, the Rehabilitation Act, and other relevant policies; reasonable accommodations and other allowable costs, such as for fellowship, training, and career development awards; diversity supplements; and the importance of maintaining communication with the institution and in the lab.
“People with disabilities are a very diverse group, and they bring a lot of creative problem solving experience to their work. And they have many years, often of experience adapting to environments that, unfortunately, aren’t always designed for their needs. And we think that type of thinking is very valuable to the problems that NIH is trying to tackle.” – Dr. Theresa Cruz
“We know that diverse teams are more innovative than sort of homogeneous teams…If we add people with disability, it really enhances the diversity of our workforce and gives us that whole other dimension and increases our creativity…we’re tackling hard and complex problems in NIH, and we can’t really afford to leave talented people out of the workforce. there’s value in that lived experience.” – Dr. Alison Cernich
These NIH Open Mike blogs from December 2022, June 2023, and May 2024 report some aggregate demographic data related to researchers with disabilities in the workforce. The NIH Center for Scientific Review also reports data on reviewers with disabilities. The data were obtained from self-reported information provided by researchers on their eRA profiles.
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NIH’s All About Grants episodes can also be heard on iTunes, Spotify, and on the NIH Grants YouTube channel. Have an idea for a future podcast? Email ExtramuralNexus@mail.nih.gov. We love suggestions!
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