In a moment marked by political polarization, global crises, institutional precarity, and uneven access to resources, research collaboration has become both more challenging and more essential. For many grant-funded teams, it is essential. This panel brings together leading scholars in current grant-funded collaborations from diverse disciplines to reflect on how collaborative research is initiated, sustained, and reimagined amid social, environmental, and institutional ruptures. Panelists will discuss the ethical, practical, and relational dimensions of working together across difference—whether across disciplines, institutions, communities, or borders—and will share strategies for building trust, navigating power dynamics, and sustaining collaboration over time. The discussion invites participants to consider collaboration not only as a means of producing knowledge, but as a practice of care, resilience, and collective responsibility in a fractured world.

Panelists include:

Nick Caverly, Asst Professor of Anthropology
Eleni Christofa, Professor of Transportation Engineering
Malcolm Sen, Associate Professor of English
Laurel Smith-Doerr, Professor of Sociology