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Faculty across �������� are leading or participating in innovative new projects to further research and education this academic year, thanks to grants recently awarded by 4-VA, a statewide consortium of nine higher education institutions in Virginia. 

“The core purpose of 4-VA is to improve efficiencies in higher education and launch novel research via collaborations that leverage the strengths of each university,” said Janette Muir, 4-VA @ Mason campus coordinator and vice provost of academic affairs. “Through 4-VA, we encourage teamwork to bring great ideas to fruition.” 

4-VA is funding four Collaborative Research Grants led by George Mason faculty with partners from other institutions. 

• Younsung Kim in the College of Science (COS) received funding for a project titled “Designing Experiential Learning Modules for Stormwater Management and Climate Adaptation via Spatial Analysis Tools.” She is working with faculty at the University of Virginia (UVA) and Virginia Tech (VT).  

• Quentin Sanders of College of Engineering and Computing (CEC) is working on “Enhancing Daily Living Activities in Stroke Survivors Through Semi-Autonomous Hand Exoskeletons with Multi-Modal Sensing” with faculty at UVA. 

• Shaghayegh (Shay) Bagheri, also of CEC, is working on a project titled “Bio-Inspired Metamaterials: Design for Additive Manufacturing” with collaborators at VT and Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU). 

• Yanika Kowitlawakul of the College of Public Health received a grant for her project titled “Development and integration of Escape Room games to enhance undergraduate nursing students’ collaboration, problem-solving skills, and academic performance.” She is working with collaborators at UVA and VCU. 

The following researchers have received 4-VA Complementary Grants to support projects managed at partner schools (listed in parentheses). 

• Silvia Danielak of the Carter School for Peace and Conflict Resolution is working on “Environmental peacebuilding as an approach for promoting just and sustainable data center governance in Virginia” (James Madison University [JMU]). 

• David Luther, COS, for “Sound Ecology: Acoustic Niche Partitioning and the effects of 17-year cicadas on avian communities across an urban gradient” (JMU). 

• Armita Kar, COS, for “Safe Streets: AI-Powered Digital Twin Framework for Enhancing Urban Pedestrian Safety” (VT). 

• Ziwei Zhu, CEC, for “Towards Fair Decision Systems:  Augmenting LLMs with Causual Graph Discovery” (UVA). 

• Ethan Ahn, CEC, for “CMOS-CIM Collaboration on CMOS+Xarrays for Compute-in-Memory” (UVA). 

• Xijin “Emma” Zhang, CEC, for “Safety Machine Learning-Driven Bio-Upcycling of Waste Concrete into High-Value Materials” (VT). 

• Tamara A. Maddox, CEC, for “Designing a Classroom Platform for Accountable Use of Generative AI in Writing” (VT). 

• Gregory Stein, CEC, for “Leveraging Digital Twin Environments and AI-Embodied Reasoning Models for Human–Robot Collaboration in Construction Tasks” (VT). 

Additionally, George Mason faculty members were awarded grants to support course redesign and bring updated and relevant materials to students in a cost-efficient manner. 

Tammy Stitz of University Libraries (assisted by George Mason faculty James Baldo, Bernard Schmidt, and Susan Lawrence) is updating the course DAEN 690 Data Analytics Engineering. 
 
Sara-Lynn Gopalkrishna of CEC is renovating the course CS 108 Introduction to Computer Programming.