The National Institutes of Health (NIH) have announced the 2008 call for applications for its extramural Loan Repayment Programs (LRPs). The deadline for these applications is December 1, 2008.
The National Institutes of Health will repay your outstanding student loans through its LRPs if you are or will be conducting nonprofit biomedical or behavioral research and meet eligibility requirements. The supported programs include Clinical Research, Pediatric Research, Health Disparities Research, Contraception and Infertility Research, and Clinical Research for Individuals from Disadvantaged Backgrounds.

ELIGIBILITY: Applicants must possess a doctoral-level degree (except for the Contraception and Infertility Research LRP); be a U.S. citizen or permanent resident; devote 20 hours or more per week to conducting qualified research funded by a university, nonprofit organization, or federal, state, or local government entity; and have qualified educational loan debt equal to or exceeding 20 percent of their institutional base salary.
BENEFITS: New LRP contracts are awarded for a two-year period and repay up to $35,000 of qualified educational debt annually.  Tax offsets also are provided as an additional benefit.  Participants may apply for competitive renewals which are issued for one or two years.  Undergraduate, graduate, medical school, and other health professional school loans qualify for repayment.  An NIH grant or other NIH funding is not required to apply for or participate in the LRPs.

For more information, visit www.lrp.nih.gov. Please note that these applications require institutional signature and must be routed in WISPER. If you plan to apply, please contact Becky Bound, 5-8443, rbound@cals.wisc.edu.