Louisiana Sea Grant’s (LSG) Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program (UROP) Program

LOUISIANA SEA GRANT COLLEGE PROGRAM
Announcement of Funding Opportunity for the
2027 Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program
Application
Application deadline for the year 2027 funding is Dec. 10, 2026, at 11:59pm CST.
The Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program (UROP) is soliciting applications
from faculty mentors of promising undergraduate students at all Louisiana universities
and colleges. UROP, established in 1992 by the Louisiana Sea Grant College Program
(LSG), offers the Louisiana undergraduate community funding to support hands-on
research experiences in marine and coastal resource issues. Previously funded projects
have dealt with topics such as coastal ecology, fisheries, aquaculture, environmental
engineering and genetics.
Approximately two to three projects will be funded depending on funds available for the
2027 project period (March 2027 to December 2027); each faculty member will receive
up to $10,000 to cover student wages, supplies and necessary travel. Both student
wages and academic credit may be earned concurrently if the policies of your institution
allow this practice. Faculty mentors of full-time undergraduate students at Louisiana
colleges and universities are eligible to submit applications. Applications must
demonstrate the proposed project’s connection and benefit to Louisiana’s coastal
communities and ecosystems.
A UROP proposal is limited to a three-page narrative single-spaced. Font must be at
least 11-point type size. All margins should be one inch. Tables, graphs, data
management plan, and references can be attached in the Additional Documents section
and are not included in the three-page limit. Any proposal narrative that goes over the
three-page limit will be disqualified.
The narrative portion must include the following information:
● Project background and description: Describe the proposed UROP project
and how it aligns with Louisiana Sea Grant’s mission and strategic initiatives.
○ What do you expect to be the project accomplishments and benefits to
both the scientific community and end-user communities of Coastal
Louisiana?
● Research approach: Succinctly describe the rationale for the UROP project, its
proposed objectives and research approach.
● Role of the UROP student: Include a description of the UROP student’s role in
the project and his/her working relationship with the faculty mentor(s).
The required Data Management Plan is separate from the three-page narrative portion
of the application. Data and information collected and/or created under NOAA grants
and cooperative agreements must be made visible, accessible, and independently
understandable to general users, free of charge or at minimal cost, in a timely manner
(typically no later than two years after the data are collected or created), except where
limited by law, regulation, policy or by security requirements. The requirement has two
basic parts: (1) environmental data generated by a grant project must be made
available after a reasonable period of exclusive use, and (2) the grant application must
describe the plan to make the data available (Principal Investigators are expected to
execute the plan).
If your project produces environmental data, it must conform to NOAA’s Data Sharing
Directive for Grants, Cooperative Agreements, and Contracts.
A typical plan is no more than two pages long (4600 characters), and includes the
sections listed below:
1. Description of data to be generated by the project, including file format, likely
size, etc.
2. A tentative date by which data will be shared
3. Standards to be used for data/metadata format and content
4. Policies on data stewardship and preservation
5. Procedures for providing access, sharing, and security
All data generated through Sea Grant funded projects are required to be completely
QA/QC’ed (Quality Assurance and Quality Control) and made publicly accessible by
two years after the end date of the project. If the proposed research will not generate
environmental data then a Data Management Plan will need to be stated as such: “This
project will not generate any environmental data.”
NOAA’s current Data Sharing Special Award Conditions (SAC) are as follows:
Environmental data collected or created under this Grant, Cooperative Agreement,
or Contract must be made publicly visible and accessible in a timely manner, free of
charge or at minimal cost that is no more than the cost of distribution to the user,
except where limited by law, regulation, policy, or national security requirements.
Data are to be made available in a form that would permit further analysis or reuse:
data should be encoded in a machine-readable format, preferably using existing
open format standards; data must be sufficiently documented, preferably using
open metadata standards, to enable users to independently read and understand
the data. The location (internet address) of the data should be included in the final
report. Pursuant to NOAA Information Quality Guidelines, data should undergo
quality control (QC) and a description of the QC process and results should be
referenced in the metadata. Failure to perform quality control does not constitute
an excuse not to share data. Data without QC are considered "experimental
products" and their dissemination must be accompanied by explicit limitations on
their quality or by an indicated degree of uncertainty.
1. Timeliness: Data accessibility must occur no later than publication of a peer-
reviewed article based on the data, or two years after the data are collected
and verified, or two years after the original end date of the grant (not
including any extensions or follow-on funding), whichever is soonest, unless
a delay has been authorized by the NOAA funding program.
2. Disclaimer: Data produced under this award and made available to the
public must be accompanied by the following statement: These data and
related items of information have not been formally disseminated by NOAA,
and do not represent any agency determination, view, or policy.
3. Failure to Share Data: Failing or delaying to make environmental data
accessible in accordance with the submitted DMP, unless authorized by the
NOAA Program, may lead to enforcement actions, and will be considered by
NOAA when making future award decisions. Funding recipients are
responsible for ensuring these conditions are also met by sub-recipients and
subcontractors.
4. Funding acknowledgement: Federal funding sources shall be identified in all
scholarly publications. An Acknowledgements section shall be included in
the body of the publication stating the relevant Grant Programs and Award
Numbers. In addition, funding sources shall be reported during the
publication submission process using the FundRef mechanism
(http://www.crossref.org/fundref) if supported by the Publisher.
5. Manuscript submission: The final pre-publication manuscripts of scholarly
publications produced with NOAA funding shall be submitted to the NOAA
Institutional Repository at https://repository.library.noaa.gov after
acceptance, and no later than upon publication, of the paper by a journal.
NOAA will produce a publicly-visible catalog entry directing users to the
published version of the article. After an embargo period of one year after
publication, NOAA shall make the manuscript itself publicly visible, free of
charge, while continuing to direct users to the published version of record.
6. Data Citation: Publications based on data, and new products derived from
source data, must cite the data used according to the conventions of the
Publisher, using unambiguous labels such as Digital Object Identifiers. All
data and derived products that are used to support the conclusions of a
peer-reviewed publication must be made available in a form that permits
verification and reproducibility of the results.
**A UROP application must be submitted by a faculty member. Students should not
submit the application but are encouraged to work with their faculty mentor in
developing the application.
Applications will be accepted until Dec. 10, 2026, at 11:59pm CST. Apply via LSG’s
online system.
NOTE: If you are having difficulty with the link, copy and paste the following URL into
your browser — https://laseagrant.infoready4.com/
Review Process
Applications will be evaluated by peer reviewers that include Louisiana Sea Grant (LSG)
Extension personnel, subject matter experts, faculty with appropriate expertise and/or
graduate students participating on LSG sponsored research (training for them also).
This process will result in a minimum of three written peer reviews that are free from
conflict of interest. Evaluations will be based upon the following review criteria and
scoring system:
● Are the methods and rationale for the proposed research appropriate?
● Does the proposal have a clearly stated objective that is achievable within the
given constraints of time and resources?
● Does the proposed research align with Louisiana Sea Grant’s mission and
strategic initiatives and demonstrate a clear connection and benefit of the
proposed project to both coastal and/or marine science and the communities
LSG serves (i.e., the potential for end-user application of the results of this
proposed research)?
● Is the role of the student clearly described in the application and will the
student have adequate support (budgeted and/or non-budgeted), as well as a
unique opportunity to experience state-of-the-art methods for sampling,
measurement and analysis?
Louisiana Sea Grant uses a five-point rating system for each review criterion for all
applications: Excellent: 5 (exhibits outstanding quality/relevance); Very Good 4: (above
average quality/relevance); Good: 3 (routine/average quality/relevance); Fair: 2
(marginal quality/relevance); Poor: 1 (missed the mark, has major deficiencies, low
relevance). In addition to the scores, the peer reviewers will make a ‘fundable’ or ‘not
fundable’ recommendation for each application reviewed.
A review panel may be convened to synthesize the results of the written peer reviews
and help LSG determine which applications to recommend for funding using the same
review criteria as the peer reviews. The panel will consist of Sea Grant staff, external
researchers and other subject matter experts with expertise in disciplines broadly
represented by the applications under consideration. The panel may include peer
reviewers and will provide significant input external to LSG to benefit from a diversity of
perspectives. The panel review component of the overall review process may be waived
if funding is available for all applications deemed fundable in written peer review or if
otherwise deemed unnecessary after written peer review in consultation with the
National Sea Grant Office.
LSG will submit a final list of projects that includes those recommended for funding to
the NSGO based on the full review process and available funding and program
priorities. The NSGO reviews and provides final approval on the projects to be funded.
LSG may forward (or not forward) a proposal for funding out of scoring rank based on
the following criteria:
● balance/distribution of funds across academic disciplines, RFA focus areas
and geography of work location;
● availability of funding;
● program-specific objectives; and
● poor performance of a PI in completing progress and final reports on previous
LSG-funded projects.
Not all highly rated projects will be funded. LSG may not have enough funding to cover
all the outstanding applications that we receive for this opportunity.
Additional Requirements and Information
Applications that are recommended for funding must submit a completed Abbreviated
Environmental Compliance Questionnaire (and copies of associated permits, if
applicable), along with a 90-2 form with objectives, rationale and methodology.
Projects that involve the use of human test subjects (including surveys) or animal
use/testing require approval of the applicant’s Institutional Review Board (IRB) or animal
care and use committee (IACUC) before such research can proceed. Applicants are
responsible for obtaining IRB or IACUC approval from their institution and providing that
documentation to LSG prior to any Sea Grant-funded human subject or animal testing.
A written final report of research accomplishments and findings, developed by the
student in collaboration with their faculty mentor, is required. The UROP final report
should include the following: Title page (with authors and date), abstract, introduction,
methods and results – i.e., the typical scientific reporting or publishing format. The
results section must include the significance of the research, considering not only the
scientific value but societal implications as well. We will accept peer-reviewed papers or
theses for this requirement. Since the peer review process takes time, a preliminary
report can be submitted and then follow-up with a published paper when the manuscript
is accepted for publishing. We do not accept posters as a fulfillment of UROP report
requirements. Students are encouraged to present their findings at university forums in
addition to state, regional, national and international conferences.
Calendar for 2026-2027
Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program
October 2026 RFP posted on Louisiana Sea Grant website and sent
out via email
10 December 2026 Deadline to submit proposals through LSG’s online
system
Mid-December to mid-
January
Late January 2027
Evaluation of proposals by peer reviewers
Convene review panel (if needed) and make funding
recommendations
Early February 2027 Notify applicants of funding status
1 March 2027 Begin new UROP projects
Contact Info:
For questions, please contact: Matthew Bethel, Ph.D.
Associate Executive Director of Research
mbethe3@lsu.edu