Funded by CNHI — Innovative Research Projects
Center for Nutrition & Health Impact
Funding for Innovative Research Projects and Commissioned Research Papers
Final Report
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Background
The Center for Nutrition & Health Impact (CNHI) recognizes the critical importance of investing in internal scientific capacity and fostering new ideas among CNHI scientists and staff, especially in an environment where external research funding has been increasingly constrained. In response, CNHI launched an internal Request for Proposals (RFP) to award small, high-impact, and innovative research and evaluation projects, as well as commissioned research papers. CNHI intends for this to be an ongoing opportunity for CNHI staff. The RFP was released January 28, 2026, and after a rigorous review process, projects and commissioned research papers have been awarded and will begin on August 1.
What We Aimed to Fund
CNHI sought proposals that advanced its mission and strategic priorities, including: healthy eating and active living, improving food and nutrition security and healthy food access, and promoting local food systems. Applicants proposed projects that were novel or incorporated an innovative approach and that could serve as the foundation for future CNHI research and evaluation. Priority was given to proposals that identified concrete outcomes (e.g., generating pilot data to submit future external funding applications or producing manuscripts, briefs, and/or reports for the CNHI website, etc.). This was a competitive funding process, and the award was based on review criteria detailed in the RFP.
Award Categories
The total funding available was up to $115,000 and the intention was to allocate across different award categories:
Innovative Research Project:
CNHI aimed to fund one innovative research or evaluation project that “pushed the envelope” on emerging or underexplored topics within CNHI’s focus areas. This award, providing up to $75,000 for a duration of up to 12 months, was intended to support pilot work or novel approaches that can serve as a launching pad for future external funding or expanded research efforts.
Commissioned Research Papers:
CNHI aimed to fund up to two commissioned research papers intended to result in high-quality, publishable manuscripts aligned with CNHI’s mission. These included narrative reviews, systematic reviews, policy analyses, or secondary data analyses. Primary data collection was not expected. Each award provided up to $20,000 to cover staff time for a duration of six months, and funded papers were required to be submitted to a peer-reviewed journal by the end of the award period.
Review and Selection Process
Applications were evaluated through a structured review and selection process designed to ensure scientific rigor, fairness, and alignment with CNHI’s mission, strategic priorities, and internal capacity.
Commissioned Research Papers were reviewed and scored at the LOI stage by the CNHI Innovative Project Development Team. This team was led by Director of Scientific Strategy Carmen Byker Shanks and project managed by Senior Engagement & Culture Manager Tony Gargano. Other team members included Chief Executive Officer Amy Yaroch, Principal Research Scientist Allison Nitto, and Chief Operating Officer Leah Carpenter.
Innovative Research Projects were first reviewed by the CNHI Innovative Project Development Team at the LOI stage. Feedback was provided to the applicant prior to the full proposal submission deadline. Upon proposal receipt and prior to external scientific review, the CNHI Innovative Project Development Team conducted an internal assessment of all full proposals to evaluate alignment with CNHI’s mission, strategic priorities, and organizational capacity. Only proposals meeting these criteria advanced to external review, and that assessment guided the scope and focus of external reviewer evaluation. CNHI engaged three leaders in the field of public health nutrition research for the external review stage.
Award Winners
Out of five submissions, two Commissioned Research Papers were awarded:
Eric Calloway, Where We Are and What’s Next for Nutrition Security Measurement: A Scoping Review
Project Summary: Nutrition security is an emerging concept that complements the more established food security, which has standardized definitions and measures. Nutrition security emphasizes the healthfulness of households’ food situations, while food security emphasizes quantity. In 2022, CNHI published the first validated nutrition security scale in the U.S. called the Household Nutrition Security Scale (HNSS). Since then, a few other measures have been created. As the HNSS and other measures begin to be used in various settings to study associations with diet-related chronic conditions, evaluate programs, and target intervention efforts, now is an opportune time to catalog the emerging measures, highlight relative strengths and use cases, and propose future research directions.
Therefore, this internally funded project includes a scoping review that will focus on the current state of nutrition security measurement and potential future directions. In parallel with the scoping review, another aspect of the project will be to streamline our measurement resources webpage to update content and make it more user-friendly. We hope this project will continue to position CNHI at the forefront of nutrition security measurements.
Alice Ann Gola, Feeding Beyond the Bell: The Promise and Gaps of CACFP Before and After School Programs
Project Summary: The Child and Adult Care Food Program (CACFP) provides free, nutritious meals and snacks to children from low-income households while in childcare. The before and after school component of CACFP provides meals and snacks to school-aged children outside of school hours, including suppers which can be a significant source of relief for families. However, participation in these programs is low among children eligible for free or reduced-price school meals. Because the current CACFP literature primarily focuses on early childcare centers (ages 0 to 5 years) and family childcare homes, less is known about the before and after school programs.
The proposed paper will use FNA’s most recent nationally representative dataset of CACFP programs (the Study of Nutrition and Activity in Childcare Settings-II, SNACS-II) to examine the characteristics of the before and after school programs participating in CACFP, the meals and snacks that are typically served and their nutritional quality, the challenges before and after school programs face to participating in CACFP, and the characteristics of the children attending the programs. The results can be used to inform both policy and technical assistance resources to increase provider, and ultimately, child participation in these important afterschool programs.
Out of four submissions, one Innovative Research Project was awarded:
Whitney Fung Uy, Farmer-Led Advisory Board: A Strategic Needs Assessment to Inform Research Priorities Driven by Farmer-to-Farmer Conversations
Project Summary: This project will strengthen CNHI’s work in food systems, specifically in food production and farmers’ roles in public health nutrition programs. Based in Tampa, Florida, Dr. Whitney Fung Uy has been cultivating relationships with farmers across the state in the past few years and hopes that this work will elevate farmers’ concerns and puts their priorities at the forefront of research initiatives. In addition to identifying Florida farmers’ needs and priorities, we also aim to explore opportunities to engage farmers in the work that we do including research and evaluation and implementation of evidence-based projects focusing on food access and health promotion. This work will strengthen connections across the food system (i.e., between food production, consumption, and recovery) and leverage funding to support local food production and sustainable agricultural practices that facilitate public health nutrition.
Additionally, this project can serve as a model to facilitate community-engaged research with community advisory boards, develop farmer-led research, and provide technical assistance and capacity building opportunities to farmers and the broader field of public health.