A statewide partnership building Oklahoma's research capacity — coordinating people, opening up research infrastructure, and growing the workforce that uses it. Summary of Proposed Work.
Led by University of Oklahoma · University of Tulsa · University of Central Oklahoma · Northeastern State University · College of the Muscogee Nation
ORION is an NSF E‑CORE project led by the University of Oklahoma (OU) in partnership with four institutions across the state. Its three interconnected Cores — the Administrative Core, the Research Facilities and Infrastructure Core, and the Workforce Development Core — and their nine objectives together define the project's principal activities.
Management, proposal development, and statewide communication.
Shared facilities, cyberinfrastructure, and research funding.
Industry partnership, undergraduate research, and K-12 STEM.
The organizational and management infrastructure for ORION.
Coordination, operations, and performance tracking across the network.
A multi-institutional team of Proposal Development Specialists.
Channels that connect researchers, students, agencies, and industry.
The Administrative Core provides the organizational and management infrastructure for ORION. The project team coordinates activities across institutions and Cores; manages project operations, budgets, compliance, reporting, meetings, and performance tracking; and maintains relationships with statewide partners. The AC supports the Project Leadership Team and External Advisory Committee, coordinates with the Oklahoma EPSCoR State Advisory Committee, and works with state partners including OSRHE, OCAST, and the Oklahoma Workforce Commission. Evaluation results and stakeholder feedback are incorporated into project management and continuous improvement.
ORION establishes a multi-institutional team of Proposal Development Specialists (PDS) to strengthen proposal development across the partner institutions and support statewide and multi-institutional submissions. The PDS team identifies funding opportunities, connects investigators and institutions, assists with proposal planning and writing, coordinates internal review, supports submission, and organizes teams for large research-capacity-building opportunities. The team also conducts grant-development workshops, shares successful practices across institutions, supports faculty participating in RFIC and WDC programs, and collaborates with OSRHE's Council on Grantsmanship and Research to extend proposal-development support across Oklahoma.
The AC builds communication channels that connect researchers, students, institutions, state agencies, industry, and other partners. ORION operates a project website as a central hub for information on research resources, facilities, computing support, funding opportunities, internships, undergraduate research, K-12 activities, professional development, and project updates. Newsletters, online office hours, workshops, presentations, and an annual Oklahoma E‑CORE Conference are used to share opportunities, showcase accomplishments, collect feedback, and strengthen interaction across the statewide research community.
Making Oklahoma's research infrastructure accessible statewide.
A coordinated, catalogued network of shared research facilities.
Expanded OSCER capacity plus the Data and AI/ML Support Hub.
Fee waivers, writing stipends, and seed awards.
ORION establishes the Oklahoma Core Facility Network (OCFN) to coordinate research facilities across institutions and make them more accessible to researchers statewide. The RFIC develops a statewide inventory and searchable catalog of major equipment, instrumentation, technical expertise, and research services. Participating institutions develop cooperative arrangements for reciprocal access, shared use, joint investment, and cost recovery. The OCFN also coordinates facility-related training, helps investigators incorporate shared facilities into research proposals, and uses an RFIC Steering Committee to guide infrastructure strategy and future statewide research investments.
The RFIC expands statewide access to advanced research computing through the OU Supercomputing Center for Education & Research (OSCER) by adding computing, GPU, and data-storage capacity and making those resources available to faculty and students across Oklahoma. ORION also establishes the Data and AI/ML Support Hub (DASH) to provide technical consultation and collaborative support for research computing, data analysis, and AI/ML.
The RFIC operates three complementary research-support mechanisms: core-facility fee waivers, summer proposal-writing stipends, and seed funding for new research projects. Fee waivers enable faculty to use advanced facilities at participating institutions; proposal-writing stipends provide dedicated time for developing competitive external proposals; and seed awards support preliminary studies and generation of data for publications and future grant applications. These programs use competitive peer review modeled on federal research funding practices, with the PDS team supporting proposal development and DASH providing data science support where appropriate.
Enable faculty to use advanced facilities at participating institutions without cost barriers.
Provide dedicated time to develop competitive external proposals.
Support preliminary studies and generate data for publications and future grant applications.
Connecting education, industry, and the next generation of researchers.
OAIP: sustained connections, internships, and micro-credentials.
OURC: statewide mentored summer research experiences.
A statewide catalog, targeted outreach, and digital badging.
The WDC establishes the Oklahoma Academia-Industry Partnership Consortium (OAIP) to create sustained connections between higher education and industry. OAIP brings together academic leaders, researchers, companies, industry organizations, and economic-development partners to identify workforce needs, emerging technology priorities, collaborative research opportunities, and talent-development needs. Through OAIP, ORION develops a statewide paid internship program connecting students with Oklahoma employers and provides participants with stackable micro-credentials through OSRHE's UpskillOK framework. OAIP also connects industry research needs with faculty expertise across the ORION network and helps develop collaborative projects supported by industry, state programs, or external grants.
ORION establishes the Oklahoma Undergraduate Research Challenge (OURC) by expanding successful undergraduate research programs at UTulsa and UCO into a statewide model. Faculty propose research projects, and students from institutions across Oklahoma apply for mentored summer research experiences. UTulsa and UCO serve as major research sites, while CMN develops locally accessible research experiences in agricultural drones and biology. Participants receive research training, professional development, course credit, micro-credentials, and opportunities to present their work at a statewide undergraduate research colloquium, with RFIC facilities and cyberinfrastructure available to participating students and mentors.
The WDC connects and expands existing K-12 STEM programs across the partner institutions. ORION creates a searchable statewide catalog of STEM camps, academies, concurrent-enrollment opportunities, and other programs; conducts targeted outreach to schools and communities; and provides financial support to improve access to selected programs. In partnership with the Tulsa Regional STEM Alliance, ORION expands the MOMENTUM digital-badging framework statewide so students can document skills and learning experiences acquired through participating STEM programs.
Nine objectives, one network.
A coordinated statewide system: support to win funding, infrastructure to do the work, and a pipeline of people to carry it forward.