The overall mission of the Pilot Project Program is to further solidify and enrich the pilot project program’s success achieved during Phase I and II of the COBRE by selecting talented mentees and highly experienced mentors with matching expertise and by providing a competent and effective administrative structure to guarantee good management, integration, and oversight of our pilot project core. This will be achieved by our team of COBRE director, project coordinators, senior mentors, core leaders, other steering committee members, and external advisory committee members. The success of their efforts will be assisted by our COBRE program administrator. This team of investigators and administrators provides a carefully designed framework to support and nurture our pilot project awardees and to ensure responsible conduct and scientific rigor and reproducibility of their research, as they are coached in their development as independent researchers. This supportive environment is created by providing the clear and rigorous selection process of awardees and mentors, by ensuring the formative and summative evaluation of the progress of the selected faculty, by instituting internal and external oversight of the pilot project program, and by the overt communication of the expectations placed upon both the awardees and mentors. The goal of these administrative and scientific efforts is to ensure high rate of our trainees obtaining their own significant independent funding.
