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A national resource on research development in the context of research administration
Pretlow, J., Bennett, C. T., & Gerstein, D. (2026). SUNDRI: A national resource on research development in the context of research administration. National Council of University Research Administrators annual meeting, New York City, New York, United States.
We present key results and a demonstration of online data access to RD/RA Support Networks at Diversified Research Institutions (SUNDRI), the first nationally representative study of academic Research Development activities in the context of Research Administration. This study, funded by the NSF GRANTED program, covers 1,300 doctoral, masters, and baccalaureate institutions. SUNDRI combines NSF and Department of Education data with a specialized 2025 survey of research administration offices at 343 institutions, using key strategies of instrument design and sample weighting to enable detailed statistical description, inference, and hypothesis testing. SUNDRI includes data on pre-award office governance and workloads, training and experience levels of key personnel, prevalence of remote and hybrid work, generalized and specialized portfolio structures, office strengths and challenges, faculty course loads, internal faculty research support, and other research-related characteristics. NCURA members can use an online portal, the SUNDRI Data Visualizer, to benchmark their own institution against similar and aspirational peer institutions and explore numerous questions of special interest to pre-award research administrators.
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