In the wake of the University of North Dakota’s recent reclassification as an “R1” University by the Carnegie Foundation, Vice President of Research and Economic Devlopment Scott Snyder has shared more about what exactly this means for students, faculty, and the Greater Grand Forks community.
“R1” refers to “Research 1” and is a classification reserved for universities that the Carnegie Commission on Higher Education deems to have “very high spending and doctorate production.” This classification is exceedingly rare for a university to obtain, with a mere 187 institutions meeting the lofty criteria out of the nearly 3,939 post-secondary schools that Carnegie looks at.
“It puts us in the company of elite research institutions across the country,” Snyder said. “So, what this does is it puts us on the map, and it gives an extra set of eyes on the University of North Dakota, thinking about where [prospective students and faculty] might come spend their career and help build this campus.”
UND’s new status as an R1 University comes as little surprise to those who have been following the school’s massive strides in research funding. The requirements needed to qualify for R1 status are $50 million in average annual research expenditures and 70 doctorates awarded to students.
“Well, in fiscal year ‘23, which is the year that Carnegie Foundation is looking at, we had $182 million in expenditures and 105 doctorate students,” Snyder said.
At the state level, UND becoming R1 puts the school in a very exclusive group; the only other college in North Dakota that has earned the coveted designation is North Dakota State University.
“We are basically neck and neck with NDSU,” Snyder said. “We have less research spending than the University of Minnesota, but Minnesota is a much larger state. UM is a much larger university, so we are really punching above our weight. We have more research expenditures than any of the South Dakota universities for example.”
This claim is corroborated by the National Science Foundation, which in 2023 collected research expenditure data from 914 institutions nationwide, ranking them from highest spending to lowest. UND ranked 144 in terms of research expenditures, while NDSU was ranked 139 and the University of Minnesota sat near the top of the list at 21.
While still taking the time to celebrate the University’s momentous accomplishment, Snyder remains dedicated to ensuring the continued success of UND’s research scene, hoping to make considerable strides in the national security space as well as biomedical fields.
“My biggest goal is to continue this great environment for research and discovery,” Snyder said. “The baseline is to support all the discovery on campus, but we do have some focal areas that we’re looking at collectively to really sort of push to the floor because we see opportunities in those areas.”
No matter what research is being conducted at the University, Snyder says that he supports all work being done by both faculty and students that make UND a beacon of innovation and learning.
“We just have a thriving research and discovery environment here on campus,” Snyder said. “We celebrate all the accomplishments of our great researchers. We really look forward to supporting them going forward.”
Quinn Berg is a Dakota Student General Reporter. He can be reached at [email protected].
