Wheaton College faculty members are regularly recognized for their excellent scholarly contributions to the academy.
Wheaton College Faculty Awards and Grants
Dr. Heather WhitneyAssessment of Repeatability and Robustness of Radiomics in Breast Cancer Imaging
The overall aim of this project is to investigate and better understand the repeatability and robustness of radiomics in breast cancer imaging. The three-year grant funded research efforts by Dr. Whitney, four undergraduate students from Wheaton College, and faculty collaborators at Wheaton College and the University of Chicago.
NIH - Breastfeeding knowledge, attitudes, and practices due to COVID-19 in Kenya
This project examines how COVID-19 has affected employment, food security and infant feeding practices among mothers employed in commercial agriculture, and 2) to determine how mothers' and healthcare workers' breastfeeding attitudes and practices have been affected by COVID-19 information and media.
CODA- Community Outreach for Developing Artists
Since its inception in 2006, CODA’s mission has been to seek out and give artistic access to underexposed talents in our community who might not otherwise have the opportunity to develop their creative abilities.
Awarding Agency:
Wurlitzer Foundation
Wurlitzer Foundation
Amount: $5,000
Duration: One year
Duration: One year
CODA- Community Outreach for Developing Artists
Since its inception in 2006, CODA’s mission has been to seek out and give artistic access to underexposed talents in our community who might not otherwise have the opportunity to develop their creative abilities.
Awarding Agency:
JCS Foundation
JCS Foundation
Amount: $100,000
Duration: One year
Duration: One year
CODA- Community Outreach for Developing Artists
Since its inception in 2006, CODA’s mission has been to seek out and give artistic access to underexposed talents in our community who might not otherwise have the opportunity to develop their creative abilities.
Dr. Thomas BoehmEducation
Awarding Agency:
Haskins Foundation
Haskins Foundation
Amount: $4,000
Start: 7/1/2018
Start: 7/1/2018
Faith and Disability Program Support
By provoking fruitful conversations, training professionals and communities, and providing practical resources, we strive to ground disability discourse in the rich Biblical teachings of community, diversity, humility, and service. Our goal is to make disciples of all people.
The Gender Identity & Faith Project
Dr. Yarhouse hopes this research will inform Christian institutions about how students are navigating and experiencing sexuality and gender questions and that it will yield resources and best practices that will enable institutions to offer students appropriate care and support as they maneuver these challenging issues.
Geophysical Characterization of a Karst Aquifer using Dynamic Recharge
The project monitors recharge-induced responses that arise as water flows into the subsurface in a karst aquifer in Florida using geophysical instrumentation to characterize the conduits, subsurface flow, and the larger karst system. The noninvasive remote sensing investigation generates knowledge for direct societal benefit, including tools to improve the creation of karst hazards maps that highlight areas susceptible to sinkhole formation, the identification of preferential flow paths relevant to contaminant transport, and the development of a methodology to determine subsurface flow for water supply considerations.
Patristic Christianity and Contemporary Immigration: An Integrative Exploration of the Tradition for the Present
This four-year project is co-directed by Dr. George Kalantzis (Wheaton College) and Dr. Myles Werntz (Abilene Christian University). This group will gather annually to assess in what ways the patristic moral and theological world reframes, critiques, and augments contemporary discussions of immigration. By examining patristic themes of journey, forced displacement, church participation in the common good, divine presence in culture, and responsibility to the stranger (to name a few), this group will draw out the riches of the patristic world for one of the most pressing moral questions of our time and will produce a series of volumes, essays, and conferences offering a Christian vision for immigration in the present.
Awarding Agency:
DOE (Department of Energy)
DOE (Department of Energy)
Amount: $83,699
Duration: 1/1/2019-3/31/2022
Duration: 1/1/2019-3/31/2022
Southwest Regional Partnership on Carbon Sequestration
The Southwest Regional Partnership on Carbon Sequestration (SWP) is one of seven regional partnerships established in 2003 by the US DOE to study carbon management strategies. At Farnsworth Oil Field (FWU), CO2 injection has been demonstrated to be an economically advantageous way of producing more oil from a mature field and storing anthropogenic CO2 that is a byproduct of other industrial processes.
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Awarding Agency:
Imago Dei Fund
Imago Dei Fund
Amount: $20,000
End: 7/30/2022
End: 7/30/2022
Wheaton Network Initiative on Gender, Development and Christianity
Christians are active in the relief, development, justice, and advocacy realms. Yet women are underrepresented in leadership across these different sectors, despite being highly engaged in nonprofit work. In light of the challenges facing women in leadership, we have launched an initiative to foster greater gender equality within the development sector, from programming on the field to conversations in the boardroom.
Ongoing
Acts of God: The Effect of Natural Disasters on God Representations via Meaning Making
Over the past 60 years, there has been a tenfold increase in the worldwide annual incidence of natural disasters. This Templeton grant supports research that explores the effects of disasters on on people's religious/spiritual lives.
African American Church Evangelism Institute
This grant effort, led by prominent African American leaders, will be used to help African American churches increase their impact in evangelism, growing by adding new believers, engaging their communities, extending their worship ministry to their community, and reaching young adults. The grant also funds initial research with African American pastors and emerging adults to insure the programs serves African American congregations well.
Awarding Agency:
Harry J. Lloyd Charitable Trust
Harry J. Lloyd Charitable Trust
Amount: $300,000
End: 6/30/2023
End: 6/30/2023
African American Church Evangelism Institute and the Wheaton College Billy Graham Hall Research Institute
This grant effort, led by prominent African American leaders, will be used to help African American churches increase their impact in evangelism, growing by adding new believers, engaging their communities, extending their worship ministry to their community, and reaching young adults. The grant also funds initial research with African American pastors and emerging adults to insure the programs serves African American congregations well.
Marion E. Wade CenterAwarding Agency:
Christ is Our Salvation
Christ is Our Salvation
Amount: $100,000
Duration: Ongoing
Duration: Ongoing
Bridging the Sacred and the Secular through Wade Authors
By helping meet operational costs for the Wade Center, which is entirely self-funded, this grant frees Wade directors to develop creative ways to reach people who are suspicious of Christianity but who love our authors. With the help of this grant, the Wade podcast is now reaching thousands of individuals in over 104 countries, several of which are predominantly Muslim.
CFICFI's Innovation Lab
CFI iLab teams are trained in a unique approach developed in-house, drawing on human centered design, social and business research, ethical/philosophical analysis, and agile project management. For the past six years, Wheaton student teams have delivered marketing plans, market research, and customer insights to Fortune 500 companies, industry associations, academic institutions, social enterprises, and non-profits nation-wide through our marketplace focused interdisciplinary project approach.
Christian Meaning Making, Suffering and the Flourishing Life
This project explores the core theme of Christian meaning-making in suffering and its relationship to flourishing. It will lead to greater appreciation of the role of emic religious constructs by researchers and mental and physical healthcare providers.
Church Evangelism Institute
Mission: Equip national denominations and pastors across the U.S. to live out the evangelistic mandate of the Great Commission, becoming conversion communities that grow primarily by adding new believers.
Awarding Agency:
Harry J. Lloyd Charitable Trust
Harry J. Lloyd Charitable Trust
Amount: $256,000
End: 6/30/2022
End: 6/30/2022
Church Evangelism Institute
Mission: Equip national denominations and pastors across the U.S. to live out the evangelistic mandate of the Great Commission, becoming conversion communities that grow primarily by adding new believers.
CODA- Community Outreach for Developing Artists
Since its inception in 2006, CODA’s mission has been to seek out and give artistic access to underexposed talents in our community who might not otherwise have the opportunity to develop their creative abilities.
Awarding Agency:
JCS Foundation
JCS Foundation
Amount: $60,000
Duration: One year
Duration: One year
CODA- Community Outreach for Developing Artists
Since its inception in 2006, CODA’s mission has been to seek out and give artistic access to underexposed talents in our community who might not otherwise have the opportunity to develop their creative abilities.
Awarding Agency:
Illinois Arts Council
Illinois Arts Council
Amount: $6,600
Duration: Ongoing
Duration: Ongoing
Fifth House Ensemble Performance & Masterclass
Fifth House Ensemble traces the lifecycle of water from its metaphorical descent from the heavens as rain, to its long journey in streams and rivers informed by conservation experts and ecologists. This grant from the Illinois Arts Council Agency partially supported a virtual concert by Fifth House Ensemble on January 29, 2021, and will also contribute to a Fifth House Ensemble Masterclass.
NIH - Identifying Risk Factors for Sub-Optimal Breastfeeding and Opportunities for Breastfeeding Promotion among Working Mothers in Kenya
The project is part of the International Research Scientist Development program, funded by the National Institutes of Health Fogarty International Center. This Kenya-based study is seeking to: 1) understand risk factors for sub-optimal breastfeeding among mothers employed in commercial agriculture; 2) to identify solutions to help employers implement mandated workplace supports; and 3) to understand a mother’s willingness to use various workplace breastfeeding supports made available by their employers.
Joint expedition to Tel Shimron as part of the Jezreel Valley Regional Project
This major research grant provides support for an international team of archaeologists, historians, anthropologists, biologists, chemists, geologists and students to excavate Tel Shimron, an ancient city in Northern Israel.
The Music of Social Protest: An Intersection of Politics and Faith in Latin America
Dr. Quiroa’s grant provides funds for four Council for Christian Colleges & Universities (CCCU) scholars to plan a research project analyzing Latin American social protest songs.
OPUSOpus: The Art of Work
Awarding Agency:
Acton Institute
Acton Institute
Amount: $40,000
Start: 7/1/2017
Start: 7/1/2017
Awarding Agency:
DOE (Department of Energy)
DOE (Department of Energy)
Amount: $46,170
Duration: 10/1/2020-9/30/2023
Duration: 10/1/2020-9/30/2023
San Juan Basin CarbonSAFE Phase III: Ensuring Safe Subsurface Storage of CO2 in Saline Reservoirs
The project is seeking to accelerate deployment of carbon capture, utilization, and storage in the San Juan Basin in New Mexico. Dr. Luhmann is working on a team that focuses on conducting experiments to assess multiphase flow and chemomechanical impacts that arise from the injection of carbon dioxide in subsurface reservoirs.
Dr. Sarah MiglioSupport Wheaton's CORE Program
With the Chatlos Foundation Grant, Wheaton College provided advanced training for Christ at the Core faculty teaching scripture and theology in key core classes, including the First Year Seminar and the Advanced Integrative Seminar.
Tel Shimron Participant Fund
The Tel Shimron Excavation seeks to understand the ancient world, including the world of the Bible, in order to provide resources for the study of Levantine history and culture from the last five thousand years.
Advancing Open Science Practices and Registered Reports in the Psychology of Religion and Spirituality
The Open Science of Religion project is focused on supporting openness and integrity in the scientific study of religion and spirituality. It is an initiative that will fund 18 research projects that use open science practices such as sharing their study expectations beforehand and sharing their data and materials after conducting their study.
Mother of the Lamb: Origin and Insight of a Global Icon
The Commonwealth Fellowship was established “to acknowledge scholars whose work digs deeply and insightfully into the cultural history that underlies the widely received notion of the common good.” Milliner will use the fellowship to finish a forthcoming book, Mother of the Lamb: Origin and Insight of a Global Icon (Fortress Press). As part of his Commonwealth Fellowship year, Milliner will workshop his writing with other IASC scholars and present a public lecture based on his research (if COVID conditions allow).
Awarding Agency:
Lilly Endowment
Lilly Endowment
Amount: $39,527
Duration: Ongoing
Duration: Ongoing
Rice U Sub: The Impact of COVID-19 and Racism on Faith at Work
During the last four years, Dr. Daniels and Dr. Ecklund used the first grant to develop and execute a national survey that garnered more than 13,000 quantitative responses and more than 200 hours of qualitative interviews to discover how congregants thought their churches related to and spoke about work.
This second grant will fund another survey, as well as follow-up interviews, to extract richer, more nuanced details from survey respondents. Much like the first grant, the results of the supplemental research will produce numerous articles, lead to presentations at conferences, and be collected in two books slated for publication in 2022.
Dr. Becky EggimannBetween Pandemic and Protest: Exploring the Future of the Liberal Arts
This grant enhances stem education on CCCU campuses by providing… structures that support faculty and student research. One of those structures is paid research leaves for Wheaton faculty… In addition, the Supporting Structures grant gives the Division of Natural Sciences at Wheaton College the money to start a Science and Faith podcast, a student chapter of the American Scientific Affiliation, a diversity training seminar for Wheaton’s science faculty, and hire Wheaton students to help with research.
Supporting Structures: Innovative Collaborations to Enhance STEM Research at CCCU Member Institutions
This grant enhances stem education on CCCU campuses by providing… structures that support faculty and student research. One of those structures is paid research leaves for Wheaton faculty… In addition, the Supporting Structures grant gives the Division of Natural Sciences at Wheaton College the money to start a Science and Faith podcast, a student chapter of the American Scientific Affiliation, a diversity training seminar for Wheaton’s science faculty, and hire Wheaton students to help with research.
Awarding Agency:
NSF
NSF
Amount: $352,070
Duration: Three years
Duration: Three years
Characterizing Molecular Flow through Protein Nanovalves
With this NSF three-year grant, the Burdens, along with their Wheaton student researchers, are studying in closer detail which molecules travel through the opening of this toxin protein and whether or not certain molecules remain trapped inside a simulated delivery vessel when the protein passageway is closed.
Awarding Agency:
McGill University
McGill University
Amount: $88,194
End: 6/30/2022
End: 6/30/2022
FY22 McGill University Senior Resident Fellow
With this appointment from McGill, Dr. Buis is teaching two graduate seminars: “Music, Social Justice, and Black Perspectives” and “Musical Citizenship and Diverse Ethnic Voices.” He is also giving public lectures on topics that reflect his expertise, including “Social Justice and the Concert Stage” and “Music Citizenship Montreal: Hidden Musicians and the Academy.” In addition, Dr. Buis has advised doctoral students and given guidance and mentorship on their research.
FY22 Carl F. H. Henry Center Senior Resident Fellow
Funded through a grant from the John Templeton Foundation, the Henry Resident Fellowship program is a key piece of Henry Center’s Creation Project. With the ultimate goal of producing scholarship around the doctrine of creation, the three-year Creation Project relies on its fellows to create world-class scholarship guided by Scripture and informed by scientific research. Over the course of the year-long fellowship, Bieber Lake will live on the campus of Trinity in Deerfield, Illinois working on the research and writing of a new book about a reader’s attention—and how a literary imagination has the power to change the reader’s mind.
Holy Ones: Crossing Racial Boundaries for the Kingdom
The grant has allowed me to study Christians who have historically worshipped together across racial lines, using case studies to explore how thinking Christianly and historically about race’s effect on American worship might help churches foster reconciliation in the present. I am writing a book for Christians on the subject, and I am using it to fund research on a chapter on John Perkins’s ministry in Mendenhall in the 1960s and early 1970s and Rock of Our Salvation Evangelical Free Church’s partnership with Circle Urban Ministries and work in Chicago’s Austin neighborhood in the 1980s and early 1990s. It has also enabled me to run workshops to receive feedback from congregations on the book chapter.
Paradiplomacy in Korea-US Relations: Its History and Potentials
The grant, awarded in Fall 2020, will culminate with an academic paper that looks at the role of American businessmen in late 19th-century paradipolomatic relations with Korea and another that highlights two paradiplomatic case studies between the U.S. and Korea. Dr. Kim and several Wheaton student researchers also plan to discuss their research as part of a conference panel.
Amount: $189,990
End: 11/30/2021
End: 11/30/2021
U of Oklahoma Subaward/Templeton: The Mitigating Effects of Humility and Social Identity on Hostility and Stress Across Political Differences
The $190,000 grant will enable Garrett and a team of faculty co-investigators to investigate how humility develops, translates to public life, and helps citizens navigate political differences. The broad purpose of the project is to shed light on strategies to reduce hostility and stress between political opponents in ways that contribute to human flourishing in public life.
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Awarding Agency:
Blue Cross Blue Shield Illinois
Blue Cross Blue Shield Illinois
Amount: $51,705
End: 6/30/2022
End: 6/30/2022
Asian American Mental Health Initiative (AAMI)
Dr. Rueger is currently collaborating with the Center for Asian Health Equity at the University of Chicago as a Co-Principle Investigator on the “Coalition for Healthy Asian Minds” Project funded by the Blue Cross Blue Shield Affordability Cures Research Grant ($1.5 million) to develop interventions to reduce stigma and encourage mental health care in the Asian American communities in Chicagoland.