Tuesday, Feb. 5, 2025

Research Town Hall | Pyramid Model | KU Brand Guidance | Conferences and Seminars

Have a news story, publication, event or staff highlight for us? Submit it by 5 p.m. Monday, Feb. 10 here.

Two decades ago, I interviewed a KU doctoral candidate in social welfare. In spare, direct language, she described surviving the trauma of Hurricane Katrina and domestic abuse, and the path that led her to KU. 

I asked about the connection between her experiences and her research interests. “You’ve either been one, or you know one,” she said.

You know a parent seeking help for their child or you are such a parent. You know a teacher trying to connect with all students in the classroom, a father of a teen with an eating disorder, a young adult struggling with substance abuse. Or it’s you. 

In the intervening years, that conversation and her succinct way of connecting research and its impact has stayed with me. It wasn’t just about her personal motivation. She focused on the potential of research to improve people’s lives by telling a story about herself, and widening it to be something that anyone could identify with. 

Mention cuts or a freeze to federal funding to the person in line with you at the coffee shop, and they may shrug. Give an example about what NIH funding, or NSF or Department of Education funding has changed or made possible, and they are more likely to see that they, or someone they know, have a stake in research that is threatened with disruption or elimination. In other words, to borrow from journalism, localize the national story. 

In the coming weeks, I am asking for your help in breaking through the noise, the social media avoidance and news exhaustion to make that kind of connection. It is our own attempt to “flood the zone,” to overwhelmingly show that research—and the funding that supports it—matters, and any loss of that research matters, too. If you have an anecdote about the impact of research on a family, an educator, a community, or something similar that can be featured as an example, I hope you will reach out. We will be digging through our archives of interviews and past news stories, too, looking for more examples we can highlight. 

-Jen Humphrey, associate director, strategic communications

Research Community Virtual Town Hall Scheduled
In response to questions about executive orders and their effect on research programs, the Office of the Provost will hold a virtual town hall from 1-2 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 6. The town hall will be live streamed on the Provost’s Office website. The Life Span Institute central office will also have it on screen in Dole 1031 if anyone would like to collectively watch with colleagues. The Office of the Provost requests submission of questions by 5 p.m. Wednesday to provost@ku.edu. A recording will be accessible on Friday, Feb. 7.

Information from the Office of Research
Last week, we provided periodic email updates about the announced freeze on research funding. We will continue to offer updates when appropriate. The most recent guidance from the Office of Research is:

- Unless you have received a specific stop-work order, keep doing your research. 
- Continue to submit proposals.
- If you have received information directly from your program officer requesting information or ordering you to stop work on a funded project, please forward all communications to Alicia Reed (amreed@ku.edu), assistant vice chancellor for research.  

Additional national news related to executive orders:

Science.org (Feb. 4)  NSF starts vetting all grants to comply with Trump’s orders: Grantee accounts remain frozen, while union accuses NSF of ignoring rules governing peer review. 

Inside Higher Ed (Feb. 3):  Trump Planning EO Directing Education Department to ‘Diminish Itself,’ Reports Say.
News reports about the potential executive order come after the Trump administration suspended dozens of department staff.

Science.org, (Feb. 4): NIH eases freeze on grant reviews imposed after Trump communications pause. However, the scheduled meetings of three NIH advisory councils were abruptly canceled today.

Associated Press (Feb. 3):  Block on Trump administration federal funding freeze will likely be extended, Washington judge says

Inside Higher Ed (Feb. 3): Orders Disrupt Academic Research. 

AAU (Jan. 31): OMB Rescinds Memo Pausing Federal Grants, But Uncertainties for Research Community Continue

A new book co-edited by Kathryn Bigelow, associate research professor at the Juniper Gardens Children's Project, is a guide for early childhood education professionals to implement the Pyramid Model framework for promoting social-emotional competence in infants and young children. “Unpacking the Infant–Toddler Pyramid Model: A Practical Guide for Teachers and Providers” is meant to be practical as well as informative. It includes checklists providers and teachers can use to reflect on implementation of the practices.

“The Pyramid Model is a tiered model in which universal practices, described in this book, benefit all children,” Bigelow said. “High-fidelity implementation of those practices can prevent many challenging behaviors. However, even with those practices in place, some children will need additional support at certain times. The secondary level includes more targeted supports, like teaching specific competencies. The third tier represents individualized interventions for preventing challenging behavior and teaching specific social and emotional skills.”

Read more about the book. 

For more than a decade, University of Kansas researchers have been developing a virtual reality system to help students with disabilities, especially those with autism spectrum disorder, to learn, practice and improve social skills they need in a typical school day. Now, the KU research team has secured funding to add artificial intelligence components to the system to give those students an extended reality, or XR, experience to sharpen social interactions in a more natural setting.

The U.S. Office of Special Education Programs has awarded a five-year, $2.5 million grant to KU researchers to develop Increasing Knowledge and Natural Opportunities With Social Emotional Competence, or iKNOW. The system will build on previous work and provide students and teachers with an immersive, authentic experience blending extended reality and real-world elements of artificial intelligence. The project is led by Life Span Institute investigators Sean Smith and Amber Rowland, together with Maggie Mosher of the Achievement and Assessment Institute. 

Read more about the project.

KU rolled out their new brand strategy, “Towering Toward the Blue,” and related supporting elements last week. 

For most of the Life Span Institute, this won't be immediately noticeable. There are a few key things to know, especially if you are developing any marketing materials aimed at public audiences, public events, or are involved in creating public presentations, publications such as annual reports, talks, social media management or e-newsletters. Increasing the value of and visibility of research is among the initiative's priorities, and there is a focus on Kansas audiences. The main details are:

More information will be shared this spring with Life Span Institute staff who have communications responsibilities.

UGRA Awardees Announced: KU named 49 students who have received Undergraduate Research Awards (UGRA) from the Center for Undergraduate Research & Fellowships. UGRA recipients are awarded a $1,000 scholarship as they work on mentored research and creative projects.  LSI affiliated investigators who are mentoring undergraduates through the program this spring are Meghan Davidson, Michael Vitevitch, Jonathan Brumberg and Margarethe McDonald.

Science News featured the book "Unpacking the Infant-Toddler Pyramid Model," co-edited by Kathryn Bigelow of Juniper Gardens Children's Project. 

The Lawrence Journal-World interviewed Michael Amlung, associate director for training at the Cofrin Logan Center on Addiction Research and Treatment, for an article about local and national trends in non-alcoholic beverages and establishments (subscription required to view).

KU News reported on the work of Briana McGeough, an affiliated researcher of the Cofrin Logan Center on Addiction Research and Treatment. 

Cofrin Logan Spring Seminar Series: The Cofrin Logan Center will welcome Dr. Margaret L. Sieger, Associate Professor at KU School of Medicine in the Department of Population Health, at 12:30 p.m. Friday, Feb. 14 for the first talk of the center's Spring Seminar Series.  The talk is in person in 1031 Dole and will be live streamed. With an academic and professional background in social work, psychology, and the legal system, Sieger brings an interdisciplinary lens to studying policies and interventions addressing parental substance use disorders (SUD) in child welfare, with particular attention to pregnant mothers and families with infants and young children.

Autism conference poster submission deadline extended to Feb. 10: All autism and related discipline trainees, primary investigators and affiliated researchers are invited to submit posters for the Autism Across the Life Span Conference.  Deadline to submit has been extended to February 10, 2025.  Presenters will be notified by Feb. 21 if their poster has been accepted. Submit posters here. 

Registration is now open for Autism Across the Life Span: The one-day conference will be held 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Friday, March 14 at the KU Edwards Campus. Presented by the Kansas Center For Autism Research and Training, the conference brings together families, autistics, researchers, educators, providers and students. Keynote speakers this year are Steve Kanne, Professor of Psychology, Weill Cornell Medical College, and Kristin Sohl, MD, Professor of Clinical Pediatrics, University of Missouri Health Care 

The 57th Annual Gatlinburg Conference: Registration is open for the Gatlinburg Conference, April 7-10th in San Diego, Calif. The 2025 theme for the Gatlinburg Conference on Research and Theory in Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities is "Memory, Attention and Executive Function."

REDCap Resource: REDCap meetups organized by Lisa Hallberg in Research Design and Analysis are held the third Thursday of each month at 1 p.m. The next meeting will be 1 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 20th, on Zoom  (code: 2025)

Save the date for trivia benefit: The Fragile X Lab, the Communication Success Lab, and the Brain Lab are putting together a Trivia Night fundraiser to benefit Autism Society of the Heartland and the National Fragile X Foundation. The event will be held Wednesday, April 16, and will be open to Life Span Institute faculty, staff, and students. More details will be in a future edition of Connections.

Collaboratory feedback and videos: Editing videos and creating closed captions to meet accessibility standards is underway and will be completed later this month. The next issue of Connections will also include highlights from the feedback received about the event.  

Connections is produced by communications staff at the Life Span Institute for affiliated researchers, staff and students. 

Writing and editing by Jen Humphrey; KU News stories by Brendan Lynch and Mike Krings
Art provided by Adobe Stock, the VOISS project and KU Marketing.

Please submit news, kudos, achievements and other items for consideration here.

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