Grambling State University to seek prestigious research designation
7th July 2025 · 0 Comments
By Piper Hutchinson
Contributing Writer
(lailluminator.com) — Grambling State University is launching a foundation to support its mission to receive a prestigious research designation currently held by only 13 historically Black colleges and universities.
The GR2 Foundation: Grambling Research and Resource Foundation is a nonprofit entity separate from Grambling State that will support the university’s academics through philanthropic fundraising. Many other universities already work with similar foundations for this.
“GR2 is the engine behind our next chapter,” said Grambling President Martin Lemelle. “As we rise toward R2 status, we are laying the groundwork for a stronger, smarter, and more sustain-able Grambling State.”
The Carnegie Classifi-cation of Institutes of Higher Education recognizes three levels of research institutions: “R1” or “R2,” meaning they are doctoral degree-granting institutions with either “very high” or “high” levels of research activity and “Research Colleges and Universities,” which goes to schools who spend at least $2.5 million annually on research, regardless of whether they confer doctoral degrees.
To obtain R2 status, Grambling will need to spend $5 million annually on research and confer at least 20 doctorate degrees. The school recently secured over $12 million in research funding, according to a university press release, including $7 million from the National Science Foundation.
Overall, there has been a dip in Grambling’s research spending over the past decade. In 2023, the most recent year in which data is available, Grambling spent less than $500,000 on research, and does not presently have a research ranking.
Theodore Callier, Grambling’s vice president for research, said launching the foundation will allow the university to scale its success in securing external funding.
Louisiana’s other R2 institutions include Southern University, one of the 13 HBCUs with the designa-tion, Louisiana Tech, the University of New Orleans and LSU Health Sciences Center New Orleans.
Louisiana’s R1 univer-sities are LSU, Tulane and the University of Louisiana Lafayette.
Xavier University of Louisiana, University of Louisiana Monroe, Southeastern Louisiana University and LSU Health Sciences Center Shreveport are designated as “research colleges and universities.”
This article originally published in the July 7, 2025 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.
