Inspiration for your Technology Improvement Award Application

Posted by Emily Hamstra on February 27th, 2025 Posted in: Funding, Technology

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NNLM Region 5 is accepting applications for the Technology Improvement Award. This $5,000 award supports the technical infrastructure needed to improve access to health information. Letters of intent for the Technology Improvement Award are due on March 11, 2025.

NNLM Region 5 has been offering the Technology Improvement Award for the past few years. Let these previously awarded projects inspire your application!

 

Awardee: Advancing Modoc

Description: With partnerships across Modoc County (CA) and the rural far north, Advancing Modoc purchased equipment to provide access to virtual health information tools in service with their families. This bilingual project provided access and support to rural community members, college students and organizational partners and extend access to NLM and NNLM’s multilingual health information resources.

 

Awardee: California Health Sciences University

Description: This project aimed to develop a user-friendly AI chatbot hosted within the California Health Sciences University library. The core objective of this initiative was to provide individuals with equitable access to high-quality health information by training on databases such as MedlinePlus, and other reputable open-access health databases, to focus the chatbot’s knowledge base. The project unfolded in several phases, beginning with the development and training of the chatbot, followed by its implementation in a strategically placed access point equipped with an interactive tablet.

 

Awardee: Oregon Health & Science University Library

Description: The Oregon Health & Science University’s Library made 3-D scanning technology more available to communities through Equipment Lending and Special Collections Outreach. Experience with creating and manipulating 3-D representations of medical and scientific objects is important to the spatial thinking and creativity of academic, research and community learners served by the OHSU Library. Creating an opportunity to experiment with this technology can provide a background that learners can build on for more advanced scientific training or inspire students to study technology. A dual approach included Library-led events and ways to expose the public to the tools themselves and libraries as a source of technological and other creative tools and enabled others at OHSU involved in science education for K-12 learners to use the scanners in their own outreach.

 

Awardee: Lake Washington Institute of Technology

Description: To increase active learning for dental students and create a library of hand skills videos for future cohorts and the public who are interested in the subject matter, a high-speed camera and special router were purchased for filming, streaming, and uploading to the cloud. The project products became part of the college library of Open Educational Resources (OER).

 

Awardee: Springfield Public Library (OR)

Description: The Springfield Public Library purchased equipment, software and peripherals to add adaptive technology to an existing computer station. By consulting with local community and government organizations (Lane Independent Living Alliance, Oregon Commission for the Blind, Developmental Disabilities Services among others) the library purchased the most relevant adaptive equipment (standing desk, screen readers, braille display etc) for the community, based on needs identified by these partners.

 

More examples of Region 5-funded awards, including additional examples of Technology Improvement Awards, are available on NNLM.gov.

Are you interested in applying for this award? Contact Emily Hamstra (ehamstra@uw.edu) to discuss your ideas and the application process.