Texas A & M University At Galveston

Texas A&M University At Galveston, a public 1862 Land Grant college and Hispanic-serving institution based in Galveston, Texas, operates as a federal grant recipient and occasional prime contractor for maritime training, oceanographic research, and coastal resilience programs, with the majority of its federal footprint rooted in cooperative agreements and research contracts rather than commercial service delivery.

The institution's federal customer base concentrates heavily in environmental and marine science funding. The top five funders by award count account for 53% of recent awards, led by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (24 awards, $388 thousand combined potential value), the Maritime Administration (8 awards, $239 thousand), the Fish and Wildlife Service Region 2 (6 awards), the Secretary of the Navy (6 awards, $300 thousand), and the Army Corps of Engineers Galveston District (4 awards, $10 thousand). NOAA dominates both volume and dollars; the Navy and Maritime Administration round out most of the remaining value concentration. Recent prime contract work includes a $121,267 purchase order from NOAA for larval DNA isolation services (awarded September 2022, completed March 2025), a $95,653 firm-fixed-price contract with Army Recruiting Command for cadet meals and STEM program support at a JROTC training event (June 2022), and a $85,609 purchase order from Army Recruiting Command for lodging and facilities supporting the Houston ISD JROTC Cadet Leadership Challenge in June 2024. A $50,000 Maritime Administration purchase order funded emergency expenses for the university's annual training cruise (February 2025). These purchase orders, valued at several hundred thousand dollars combined, sit alongside larger research grant activity.

The institution's grant footprint spans marine science, coastal engineering, and defense research. NOAA cooperative agreements anchor the portfolio: a $287,347 award for microplastics transport research in coastal estuaries (July 2022–July 2025, CFDA 12.630), a cooperative agreement for queen conch genetic population analysis and endangered species recovery planning (July 2025–June 2027), and an award for penaeid shrimp gene expression measurement in Northern Gulf estuaries (September 2023–August 2024). The Army Corps of Engineers Civil Works issued a cooperative agreement for in-situ measurements of physical forces and geotechnical parameters in coastal and estuarine systems in the Galveston District (September 2022–March 2026). The Office of Naval Research funded a project grant for a programmable logic controller static application security testing system to detect code vulnerabilities (July 2023–June 2025). The U.S. Military Academy at West Point issued a cooperative agreement for an intelligent network intrusion detection system research project (June 2022–December 2025). The Maritime Administration awarded a cooperative agreement for pier improvements at the Texas A&M Maritime Academy (September 2024–October 2025).

As a sub-recipient, the university operates across multiple grant programs under state and peer-institution prime grantees. It subcontracts to William Marsh Rice University on flood resilience and AI systems projects (RAISE program), participates in Louisiana State University–led ecosystem monitoring and connectivity research in the Flower Garden Banks National Marine Sanctuary, supports Texas Parks and Wildlife Department on fisheries ecology and habitat assessment work, and works under Texas Division of Emergency Management on dredging and recreational area repairs. A sub-award from Boston University involved dissolved organic carbon and biomarker analysis in Arctic research (June 2022). The institution also performs sub-recipient work under Texas A&M AgriLife Research on PFAS biomarker discovery and under the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality on aquifer-surface water connectivity assessment at a Superfund site.

The institution's award activity has remained modest and episodic. Over the past five years, annual awards ranged from five (2026 year-to-date) to thirteen (2024), with combined potential value across ninety total awards standing at $1.5 million against $115.2 million in obligated dollars — a sign that the institution's federal footprint consists primarily of fully funded or over-obligated research agreements rather than option-laden IDIQs. Only one award faces ultimate completion within the next twenty-four months, presenting minimal recompete exposure. The Service Contract Inventory reports no prime service contracts above the $150,000 threshold; sub-recipient SCI activity shows minimal federal services labor (0.3 FTEs in FY2024, 1.2 FTEs in FY2025), reflecting the institution's posture as a research and training entity rather than a federal services prime. The institution competes predominantly as a research grant recipient under full-and-open solicitations, with occasional maritime training and facility-support purchase orders, and frequently participates as a sub-recipient under peer-institution and state-agency grant vehicles.