University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
The Coordinated Science Laboratory
National Center for Principled Leadership & Research Ethics

About

About NCPRE

NCPRE is housed in the Coordinated Science Laboratory in The Grainger College of Engineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Founded in 2012, we started with an NSF-funded project in research ethics, and have come to see that fostering an ethical climate is inseparable from a wider culture of institutional integrity and principled, effective leadership. For us, leadership—and particularly ethical leadership—is a key component of setting institutional tone and promoting excellence in professional interactions and achievements.

NCPRE’s work is based on evidence-based practices and research on research integrity, misconduct, and cultures of excellence, which focus on professional skills and dispositions typically not focused on during discipline-focused education or compliance-based Responsible Conduct of Research training. 

We are fortunate to be able to draw on the expertise of a broad range of consultants, and together with them the NCPRE team draws on a number of previously developed, evidence-based, and time-tested strategies, tools, and skills.

Some of our projects include:

  • HHMI: Helping to create the Labs that Work… For Everyone (LTW) program, which will be dispersed to academic units for the purposes of educating on ethical laboratory and scientific practices, improving cultural competence, and helping researchers for together more effectively.
  • AGU: In congruence with American Geophysical Union, NCPRE has created several research integrity tools. These tools are meant to be test various aspects of an academic environment.
  • NTU: In partnership with the Nanyang Technological University (NTU), NCPRE runs the NTU Leadership Academy. The program incorporates an evidence-based approach that educates those in academic roles on university decision-making, ethical sensitivity and integrity, and leadership competencies. The program takes place in Singapore, and aims at giving leaders the tools necessary for strategic planning at a university.
  • NSF Grant: NCPRE has received grant funding from the National Science Foundation in order to pursue the continuation of its research and development of leadership and academic materials