The “Specific Aims Group”

Greetings again. I hope you’re doing well.

Recently some colleagues and I received a lunch invitation. It came from a young researcher in our department. The lunch, we learned, was to celebrate the researcher’s receiving a grant.

This researcher and those of us whom he invited belong to a group that another young researcher started. This group reviews parts of grant proposals that members have drafted. We meet once or twice a month for about an hour. Usually we discuss drafts by one or two members.

Group members bring drafts of key parts of their proposals. Often the part is what the US National Institutes of Health calls the “specific aims”. Therefore the founder named our group the Specific Aims Group.

Our group members come from varied fields of biomedical research. Members with expertise in the research area of the proposal can comment helpfully on the scientific content. All of us can provide useful feedback on the writing.

The researcher who invited us to lunch said he benefited from being part of the group. Although the group has not reviewed anything of mine, I too have benefited, as I have learned a lot from seeing the drafts and participating in the discussion.

Our group is a type of writing group. Such groups can provide valuable feedback and learning. Also, the meetings can be good incentives to write.

If you have such a group, I encourage you to post a comment. And if you don’t have such a group, I encourage you to consider starting one. Maybe soon you too will go out to a celebration lunch!

Until the next post—

Barbara