More about the CDC-AAMC Cooperative Agreement

A cooperative agreement (CA) is a major mechanism used by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to support extramural research. Unlike the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the CDC does not usually support extramural research by funding investigator-initiated proposals. Instead, the CDC seeks proposals in areas of programmatic interest to the various Centers, Institutes, and Offices (CIOs) within the CDC. Such proposals are solicited by working with partnering organizations under the terms of a CA. The projects that are funded are viewed by the CDC as collaborative ventures with CDC staff.

Under the terms of a CA, the role of the partnering organization (AAMC, in this case) is largely to broker programmatic activities between the CDC CIOs and the organization's members. There are four pathways by which programmatic ideas may be generated and may potentially lead to a funded project:

1. A CIO may issue to the AAMC a Request for Application (RFA) seeking proposals that address a very specific issue of interest to the CIO.
2. A CIO may invite proposals by announcing to the AAMC Potential Extramural Research Topics (PERTs) of interest.
3. The AAMC might seek to interest a CIO in a topic proposed by AAMC staff.
4. The AAMC might seek to interest a CIO in a topic proposed by an AAMC member institution.

In each case, the initial communication is between the CDC and the AAMC. The RFAs and PERTs that are issued by the CDC are not distributed directly to AAMC member institutions, but to the AAMC. Similarly, member institutions that wish to propose topics of interest should not communicate directly with CDC, but communicate their interest to the AAMC.

The AAMC will establish lines of communication with member institutions, so that the CA-related information can be conveyed and responded to in a timely manner. The AAMC proposes to transmit relevant information directly to the members of the dean's staff who are responsible for medical education and research, since most of the programmatic topics will fall into those domains.

The AAMC believes that the opportunities afforded by this new funding mechanism will, over time, permit the academic medicine community to augment significantly its contributions to the nation's public health agenda.

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