Congratulations to Drs. Jeff Cohen and Joy McCorriston for each receiving funding for projects through the Ohio State Seed Fund for Racial Justice! Implemented at the request of President Johnson, "this program seeks to develop exploratory research approaches and creative ideas that will help contribute to the elimination of racism and solve its underlying causes and consequences on our campuses, in our community, and across the nation." Cohen and McCorriston's projects were two of ten awarded funding in the first round of awardees. 

Dr. Cohen's project seeks to address the "digital divide," the disparity in access to communication and information technologies, specifically within the central Ohio Bhutanese community in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. Dr. Cohen, alongside colleagues at Denison University, The Ohio State University College of Social Work, National Institutes of Health, and the Bhutanese Community of Central Ohio, seeks to understand the challenges posed by the digital divide and how they have been compounded by COVID-19 public health measures, as well as constructing effective strategies to address them alongside members of the community themselves.

Dr. McCorriston's project, drawing inspiration from the history of international campuses for US-based institutions, seeks to establish a linkage between Ohio State and a Historically Black College or University (HBCU). In creating OSU-HBCU, the team of partners including members from Academic Search, Ohio State Engineering, Ohio State Libraries, the Office of International Affairs, and the Atlanta University Center Consortium, they hope to develop a model for such a partnership and identify one HBCU for participation.

To learn more about the other first round awardees of the Seed Fund for Racial Justice, click here.