Wabanaki TURTLE

WABANAKI TURTLE While Wabanaki people have conducted research activities since time immemorial to promote the health and welfare of their communities, Wabanaki citizens are underrepresented as health researchers, including at Wabanaki Public Health and Wellness (WPHW), the applicant organization for the Wabanaki Tribal Undergraduate to Graduate Training and Leadership Experiences (TURTLE) Program. WPHW serves the four federally recognized Tribes of Maine. According to WPHW’s director of research, there are fewer than five Wabanaki citizens with a postgraduate health-research training degree whose work addresses Wabanaki health disparities. The underrepresentation of Wabanaki citizens amongst health researchers is important to note because Wabanaki communities experience health disparities in comparison to the all-races Maine population. An increased representation of Wabanaki health researchers can address these disparities which include a self- reported diabetes prevalence of 17.0% in comparison to 9.6% for Maine residents. According to the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, increasing the proportion of American Indian and Alaska Native (AI/AN) health researchers can address such health disparities, underscoring the importance of training future AI/AN health researchers. To address Wabanaki health disparities we plan to create Wabanaki TURTLE, an undergraduate research training program that seeks to develop a pool of scientists to conduct research on Wabanaki and other AI/AN health and health disparities. We will develop and implement an effective training program for undergraduate students that seeks to enhance their technical, operational, and professional skills required to conduct AI/AN health research in a culturally appropriate, ethically responsible and rigorous manner. The program will support the students to complete a bachelor's degree in a biomedical field, and ultimately to transition into careers in the biomedical research workforce. Our Specific Aims are to: 1) Build WPHW’s administrative capacity to implement and evaluate Wabanaki TURTLE. 2) Develop and implement the Wabanaki TURTLE Program’s curriculum, a 12-month research training program to enhance research skills of ten Indigenous undergraduate students annually, over a 5-year period. 3) Develop new and strengthen existing partnerships with academic institutions and organizations for purposes of student recruitment, identification of mentors, and providing trainees with research experiences, career development, cohort building, and networking opportunities. Project Number: 1UE5GM161880-01 | Fiscal Year: 2026 | NIH Institute/Center: National Institute of General Medical Sciences (NIGMS) | Principal Investigator: Leigh Neptune (+1 co-PI) | Institution: WABANAKI HEALTH AND WELLNESS, BANGOR, ME | Award Amount: $463,435 | Activity Code: UE5 | Study Section: Special Emphasis Panel[ZRG1 MBBC-R (55)] View on NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/11265238