ARCHD-T32 Pre-Doctoral Training Scholarship

The Arkansas Center for Health Disparities (ARCHD) was awarded a five-year research training grant in 2020 by the National Institute of Minority Health and Disparities. Funded by the Office of Behavior and Social Sciences Research (OBSSR), this brand-new, cutting-edge program will create a cohort of researchers who can critically address the severe health inequalities in the state through advanced data analytics. ​

The ARCHD-T32 Program is part of a national network of esteemed universities who are also funded by the OBSSR at the National Institutes of Health. The participating universities are: Emory University, Johns Hopkins University, Stanford University, University of California at Berkeley, University of California at San Diego, University of California at San Francisco, and the University of Washington.

Our trainees will actively participate with students and mentors from the above institutions. In addition, program staff from five NIH institutes and OBSSR will be participating in shared activities to develop state-of-the art training programs for incorporating advanced analytic techniques into PhD programs in the social sciences.

Meet our Trainees

Antonije Lazic

Antonije Lazic is a PhD student in Health Systems and Services at UAMS’s College of Public Health. His research interests include barriers to access, optimization of clinical resources, and data analytics. Prior to starting his PhD, Lazic worked as a graduate assistant conducting Lean Six Sigma research for an academic medical center, where he gained experience in productivity, staffing, simulation, and patient flow.

Matthew Najarian

Matthew Najarian is a PhD student in the Pharmaceutical Evaluation and Policy Program at UAMS’s College of Pharmacy. He graduated with a bachelor’s degree in economics from Seattle University and an MPH from the Brown School at Washington University in St. Louis. Matthew previously worked for the Center for Health Economics and Policy and was a Graduate Research Fellow. His past areas of research focus on rural and urban insurance utilization and Medicaid Policy. At UAMS, Matthew will join a diverse team researching variations in rural hospitals’ adoption of Remote Patient Monitoring. He will further pursue health disparities in prescription drug utilization with the overarching goal of helping disadvantaged and underprivileged populations across the health care field.

Benefits of becoming an ARCHD-T32 Trainee

• Stipends of $25,320 a year, plus tuition scholarships
• Collaboration with a national network of T32 sites
• Access to travel & research funds
• Externship opportunities at collaborating programs
• Advanced training in data analytics and informatics
• Diverse mentorship
• A significant training accomplishment for your CV

Join Us

How to Apply

If you are enrolled or plan to enroll in one of our participating PhD programs (Epidemiology, Health Promotion and Prevention Research, Health Systems and Services Research, Nursing, or Pharmaceutical Evaluation and Policy), we’d like to hear from you! PhD students with an interest in disparities research and with the quantitative skills for conducting advanced analytics research are strongly encouraged to apply.

Application Requirements:

To apply, please email the following materials to our Program Coordinator, Caroline Millar, at mcmillar@uams.edu, by our deadline of May 26th, 2021.

• Resume or CV
• Transcripts (unofficial)
• GRE test scores (unofficial)
• Letter of Recommendation from PhD Program Director
• Research Statement: see directions below.

Please describe how learning advanced analytics will help you reach a better understanding of healthcare disparities; how you plan to use training in advanced analytics and healthcare disparities in your research goals; and where you would like to see your career in five years following training in the ARCHD-T32 program.

Questions?

For more information, please contact our Principal Investigators below, or the Director of the PhD program in which you are enrolled.