These sponsored program projects are a few of the various activities that our faculty and staff are engaged in as part of their teaching, scholarly work and research at Missouri State University, during fiscal year 2008.


Dr. David Hough, dean of the College of Education, and Joan Armstrong-Tiehen, associate director of Project ACCESS, received $303,576 from the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education to provide professional development to Missouri educators and to assist parents with children who experience autism spectrum disorder.

Dr. Dale Law, executive director for the Viticulture and Enology Science and Technology Center (VESTA), Dr. Barry Gump and Dr. Stanley Howell, per course faculty at the West Plains Campus, and Dr. Karl Wilker, associate research professor of agriculture, received an award of $1,645,899 from the National Science Foundation to ensure that the VESTA Regional Center of Excellence is established and sustained in a manner that addresses the needs of the Mid-America region grape and wine industry.

Regina Bowling, director of the Southwest Missouri Area Health Education Center, and Dr. Helen Reid, acting dean of the College of Health and Human Services, received $638,905 from the Missouri Foundation for Health to establish the Missouri Health Literacy Enhancement Center.

Allen Kunkel, associate vice president for economic development, received $142,559 from the Missouri Department of Economic Development to support the operation of Springfield Innovation, Inc. (formerly JVIC, Inc.) as one of only nine Missouri Innovation Centers. Springfield Innovation, Inc., is a non-profit organization that helps entrepreneurs bring new technologies to the marketplace.

Dr. Gary Meints, Assistant Professor of Chemistry, received an award from the National Institute of Health, in the amount of $175,099, to conduct a project entitled “Solid-State NMR Studies of the Dynamics and structure of Damaged DNA.”  The goal of this project is to determine dynamic and structural information from damaged DNA and associated repair enzymes and apply this information to understanding the fundamental aspects of DNA repair.

Dr. Larry Campbell, Professor of Mathematics, was awarded $82,111 from the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education via the Ozark School District for the Missouri Middle Grade Mathematics Leadership Academy.  This project will seek to provide on-going, school-based, professional development for Missouri 6-8 grade mathematics teachers.