I think the important distinction is that we ARE their allies, but they often don't feel like it and may not feel they can come to us for support.

I'm fortunate enough to have strong relationships with my PIs as a result of both our departmental structure and sustained relationship building, but I've heard so many horror stories at conferences and so on of RAs who are treated as though they're an active barrier. The more that we're able to reinforce that we're here to support them, and to be seen as a partner in furthering research as a whole, the better for all involved.

The way I describe my role when people ask is that my job is to worry about the myriad of details relating to finances and organizational, state, and federal regulations, so that our program staff/PIs can focus on what they do best. I couldn't do the science that they do, but they could not maintain full compliance without me. We have different skillsets and different roles, and together we're able to do some really amazing work.

Katie Walker | Director, Finance & Administration | Center for Psychiatric Rehabilitation
Boston University | Sargent College of Health & Rehabilitation Sciences
xxxxxx@bu.edu  |  cpr.bu.edu  | 940 Commonwealth Avenue, Boston, MA 02215

-----Original Message-----
From: Elise K Mills - elisem at berkeley.edu (via resadm-l list) <xxxxxx@lists.healthresearch.org>
Sent: Thursday, February 20, 2025 2:01 PM
To: xxxxxx@lists.healthresearch.org
Subject: Re: [RESADM-L] Name-that-Malaise

Dear all,
I disagree that we are not their allies. Whatever is our purpose than to NOT support them & the research?
Yes, we sometimes have to say no, but none of the stop works, pauses, cancellations, funding reductions, etc. are coming from our actions. And considering most of our PI's have PhD.'s, they know very well we are not the one's impeding their projects.

I for one intend to support them in any way I can. I have heard some are going to propose - to multiple federal sponsors & where there's possibility outside the federal government.

I see no way forward than to continue to try to extend kindness and civility to each other, and do our best to expand the circle of resources available to them to try to gain further support for their activities.
My hope is that some influencers who have one foot in education and another in venture capital, ex. in Silicon Valley will manage to help persuade some to see the path forward to stabilize our country and the research and education future of all.

How do we grow and survive  if we destroy the very seeds that are necessary to germinate and determine our future?
Elise

Elise Mills
Contract & Grant Manager
University of California, Berkeley
ERSO, Berkeley Regional Services
ERSO Main Phone:  510-664-7800
Google Voice:  510-859-8641
HOLIDAY: March 28, University Offices Closed

SCHEDULE:  9-6 (telecommuting)

On Thu, Feb 20, 2025 at 10:49 AM Andrea Buford <xxxxxx@oakland.edu <mailto:xxxxxx@oakland.edu> > wrote:

	I think I've figured out a little of what's causing the morale dip I see here and certainly among the staff who report to me.  OK, and in myself as well.  I'm going to copy an email I sent to the VPR this morning - not because I think it's particularly great.  But because I think we need to talk about what's going to happen to our relationships with faculty upon which this work depends, what's going to happen to the profession, and how the HECK do we authentically take care of each other in ways that are more meaningful than @)(#*@)(* Hawaiian shirt day.

	Remember that he was the originally-intended audience for what follows, so do some extrapolation to make this generalizable.  Again, I'm not looking for political responses.  I'm looking for profession-level thoughts and musings.

	 <https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/a/ACg8ocKUfuzKpZ3_dX4Lq1eP0aE11U1AJdq0ZA6SPFQyE5HH49L1ssE=s40-p>

Andrea Buford <xxxxxx@oakland.edu <mailto:xxxxxx@oakland.edu> >

1:22 

	We have done such a good job as a staff (bragging a little - but wait... I see its limitations) of putting faculty first.  We look at policies, procedures, requests from the faculty etc all through the lens not of how to make things easier for us but how to make things better for the faculty.

	We haven't turned the tide yet of getting them to fully see us as partners in the research enterprise.  Not even close.  I know that, but that's where we're headed.  And even when they think we're blocking their work, we are often doing something else that they don't see which is smoothing things out for them.

	And now, we are the face of undoing their research projects- making them smaller, reframing them altogether.  Every day lately, the questions are more "how can we minimize the damage?" "How many cuts to the DEI language are enough (to which we can only answer that we don't know).  Does finding a non-federal sponsor even help? (probably not)  Would it help to take my black/disabled/trans (or whatever) GA off the project?  Should I stop the outreach I had planned in Detroit?  Should I disband the Community Advisory Board designed to inform me of the needs of a variety of sub-populations?

	It has always been true that research administrators have to sometimes enforce unpopular rules.  We have always had to say no, from time to time.  That's not news.  What we have tried to do here is to find some legal-but-creative way to get to yes whenever we can, on behalf of the faculty.  Faculty know, unless they're living under a rock, that we are not the instigators of these new rules.  They know we're only doing what we have to do. But we are the people they see when their research is interrupted or endangered.  We get cast in the role of collaborator in the destruction of science.

	It's defeating to know (or strongly suspect, more accurately) that many of them aren't going to reach out again for creative push-pull conversations about how to get their work done in the least restrictive environment.  I'll honestly be surprised if proposals don't nosedive.  We aren't their allies in this  - and that just stinks.  Research administrators don't come to work every day motivated by a desire to take science apart, after all.

	--

	Andrea Buford
	Director, Office of Sponsored Programs
	Oakland University
	(248) 370-3789

	Pronouns: she/her/hers

	Oakland University resides on the ancestral, traditional, and contemporary lands of the Anishinaabe, known as the Three Fires Confederacy, composed of the Ojibwe, Odawa, and Potawatomi. The land was ceded in the 1807 Treaty of Detroit and makes up southeast Michigan.

	- = - = - = - = - = - = -

	This email was sent to xxxxxx@berkeley.edu <mailto:xxxxxx@berkeley.edu>  via the Research Administrator's mailing list.

	To unsubscribe from RESADM-L, go to https://lists.healthresearch.org and enter your subscribed email address into the "My account and unsubscriptions" area at the bottom of the page. This also allows you to switch to Digest Mode or to temporarily suspend emails. You will be emailed a link to change all these settings.

	List archives are available at: https://lists.healthresearch.org/resadm-l

	Please keep in mind that responses are copied verbatim to 10,000+ users - - please refrain from "Me Too"s and clicking on reactions to emails. That will keep your email environment clean. Thanks!

- = - = - = - = - = - = -

This email was sent to xxxxxx@BU.EDU via the Research Administrator's mailing list.

To unsubscribe from RESADM-L, go to https://lists.healthresearch.org and enter your subscribed email address into the "My account and unsubscriptions" area at the bottom of the page. This also allows you to switch to Digest Mode or to temporarily suspend emails. You will be emailed a link to change all these settings.

List archives are available at: https://lists.healthresearch.org/resadm-l

Please keep in mind that responses are copied verbatim to 10,000+ users - - please refrain from "Me Too"s and clicking on reactions to emails. That will keep your email environment clean. Thanks!