Board Of Trustees Of Southern Illinois University

Board of Trustees of Southern Illinois University, doing business as Office of Sponsored Projects Administration, operates as a federal grant recipient and research institution administering federal funding for academic and scientific research conducted across Southern Illinois University's Carbondale campus. The university receives no federal contract prime awards and does not compete for traditional federal procurement vehicles; instead, it serves primarily as a recipient of federal research grants and cooperative agreements from civilian agencies funding fundamental and applied science, environmental studies, workforce development, and educational programming.

SIU's research portfolio spans multiple scientific disciplines with particular concentration in life sciences, environmental biology, materials science, agricultural technologies, and mathematical sciences. Recent representative work includes a $650,000 cooperative agreement from the Department of Agriculture's National Institute of Food and Agriculture (CFDA 10.310) for agricultural STEM education programming on precision agriculture technologies; a $2 million project grant from the Department of Health and Human Services Health Resources and Services Administration (CFDA 93.732) for certified recovery support specialist training in rural communities; a $383,119 grant from NASA for research on phyllosilicate and sulfate-bearing phases on Mars; and a $546,335 project grant from the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (CFDA 93.853) investigating brain circuits governing social decision-making under resource constraints. The university also maintains cooperative agreements with the U.S. Department of Agriculture for pallid sturgeon genotyping research and with the Department of Interior Fish and Wildlife Service for deer and disease ecology studies.

Federal customer concentration is highly distributed across 128 distinct agencies. The five largest funders account for 39% of recent awards: the National Science Foundation leads with 153 awards across mathematics, engineering, computer science, and STEM education; the National Institutes of Health provides 58 awards for biomedical research; the Administration for Children and Families funds 48 awards primarily for workforce training and nutritional assistance pass-through programs; the Department of Agriculture's NIFA funds 22 awards for agricultural research and food systems; and the Fish and Wildlife Service Region 3 provides 22 awards for wildlife management and ecological research. By potential dollar value, NASA's Shared Services Center dominates with 17 awards and $3.7 million combined potential value, followed by the Army Corps of Engineers and the U.S. Geological Survey with substantially smaller award pools. The university's obligated funds ($404.3 million across all awards) far exceed its combined potential value ($6.9 million), reflecting the long history of federal research investment and completion of prior-year awards.

SIU functions as a sub-recipient on select federal research grants, partnering with prime grantees including Wayne State University, the University of Michigan, Iowa State University, Ohio State University, and various Illinois state agencies. Recent subcontract roles include collaborative neuroimaging research with Wayne State on hyperpolarized xenon-129 MRI, aquaculture research with Florida Atlantic University, and agricultural pest management studies with Michigan State University. The university also serves as a subcontractor through KBR Wyle Services on Air Force Research Laboratory device and component trade studies and analyses, generating modest engineering services revenue streams.

The university's activity trajectory shows growth through 2024 (75 awards) followed by a decline in 2025–2026 (44 and 22 awards respectively), reflecting normal fluctuation in federal grant portfolios rather than sustained decline. Thirty-two awards with completion dates in the next twenty-four months carry combined potential value of $148 thousand, representing typical annual recompete activity rather than concentration risk. SIU does not pursue federal contracts under set-aside programs, does not operate on government-wide acquisition vehicles, and does not compete in the federal contractor marketplace; its posture is exclusively that of a research institution and federal grant recipient managing sponsored projects across its academic and research enterprise.