Mission & Membership

Timeline:

  • Complete applications are due by February 1st

  • Application decisions will be made by April 1st

Mission & Membership Info Doc

Cores Mission:

The Consortium of Rural States (CORES) is a collaborative research consortium of academic medical institutions that are working to improve health in rural communities and are funded by the Clinical & Translational Science Award (CTSA) from the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS) at the National Institutes of Health. Through inter-institutional pilot funding and sharing best practices, CORES aims to accelerate research efforts that can reduce the burden of illness and mortality in rural populations. Each institution also serves its University to capture the CTSA mission and to promote translational science at each site.

Achieving Our Mission:

As CTSA institutions, CORES members have a shared mission of advancing translational science but also to address the needs of our predominantly rural populations. To achieve this overarching goal, we focus on many different collaborative efforts in the spirit of stimulating novel research, improving our practices, and building the translational science workforce. Below are examples of collaborative efforts that are ongoing among CORES members. Future initiatives are not limited to these efforts, and priorities will evolve with the mission of the CTSA program and the needs of the communities we serve. When appropriate, it is expected that collaborative relationships may be formalized by specific implementation agreements among the parties.

  • Evaluation and dissemination

  • Community engagement, to effectively engage communities and practices in the translational science process via bidirectional dialogues, to ensure that all populations are represented in research and benefit from biomedical advances.

  • Emerging technologies to foster advances in translational research through integration of basic and clinical research to gain insights into the mechanism of disease

  • Career building and mentoring activities, including pre-submission grant review

  • Pilot research programs for preliminary and proof-of-concept studies critical to moving basic laboratory findings into clinical applications

  • Integrated and interdisciplinary education, training, and career development in Clinical and Translational Science, including curriculum and program development, clinical research training, best practices in recruitment and mentoring

Membership:

The membership will include CTSA hubs with current or recent CTSA grants in the G and T funding tiers (small
and small-medium CTSAs). The limitation of CORES membership to small and small-medium CTSA hubs is
intended to bring together hubs with similar resources and with a similar impact on their respective institutions.
In addition, the CORES members intend to keep the consortium limited in size to preserve the collegiality of
membership. There are several requirements of hubs that wish to be CORES members:

1. Hubs must serve a predominantly rural region and have programs in place that address rural health.

2. Hub leadership (PI/MPI’s and Administrative leader) will actively participate in CORES activities. Additional hub members, such as evaluators, marketing & communication, community engagement, and others, will also participate in CORES activities. This participation will include, but is not limited to:

  • Attend meetings and actively participate in discussions and in subgroups

  • Collaborate with other CORES sites

  • Participate in pilot programs with resources and interested researchers

  • Be accountable for information sharing with colleagues and leaders

  • Contribute agenda items

  • Model and adhere to consensus

  • Be accountable to support the decision and implementation of the work

  • Uphold purpose and scope of CORES

3. Adhere to the CORES Memorandum of Understanding.

4. Each year, one CORES site serves as the administrative lead site, and this duty rotates among the members.

All CORES members will serve in this role. Duties during this year of administrative leadership will include, but is not limited to:

  • Collaborate with CORES PI and MPIs

  • Schedule and facilitate the PI/MPI, Administrative Directors, and Pilot meetings and manage CORES communications including the CORES website

  • Identify topics and venues for networking, workforce, communications and annual CORES conference

  • Lead the pilot program administration

  • Orient next administrative lead site

Application Process:

We invite interested CTSA hubs to be considered for inclusion into CORES by specifically describing how they meet the criteria described above. Please provide a one-page description that addresses:

  • How your hub will contribute to CORES and how you hope to benefit from participation in CORES

  • Description of your CTSA hub and evidence of your service to a predominantly rural region and programs in place that address rural health

  • Confirm willingness to engage with CORES members as described in this document and serve as administrative lead site when assigned

  • In what other consortia you are participating