NC PIE Abstract The UNC CFAR, a consortium comprising UNC Chapel Hill, Research Triangle Institute (RTI) and Family Health International (FHI), has actively partnered with the North Carolina (NC) Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) since its inception 27 years ago. CFAR outreach has focused primarily on four NC HBCUs (Winston-Salem State University [WSSU], NC A & T State University [NC A&T], NC Central University [NCCU], St. Augustine University [SAU]). Our outreach is based on the basic tenet that to achieve equity in HIV research and care we must ensure greater representation of communities of color in the relevant scientific and medical disciplines. Engagement of these HBCUs has been multilayered and includes: providing developmental awards to HBCU faculty; facilitating HBCU and underrepresented community engagement at the regional and national level by sponsoring attendance at national meetings; funding and conducting workshops in research writing for HBCU faculty; offering access to academic journals at the UNC library system by making HBCU faculty UNC affiliates. In 2021, with funding made available from the initial CFAR Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Pipeline Initiative we established the NC Program for Inclusive Excellence (NC PIE), a yearlong paid internship for graduate and undergraduate students with two partner HBCUs-NCA&T and NCCU. NC-PIE, refunded in 2022 and 2023, has enrolled 10 interns to-date, six of whom have completed the internship. Of these six interns, three intend to apply to medical school, one to a physician associate program, one to a masters of public health program and one is completing her doctoral program and working at UNC for the NC Translational and Clinical Sciences Institute. In this application we propose to 1) Continue with NC-PIE and increase number of interns from 3 to 4. 2) Add a new immersive on-campus 10 week summer research program by partnering with the UNC Department of Microbiology and Immunology 3) Introduce NCCU undergraduate students to infectious diseases specifically HIV by developing and implementing a six part lecture series as part of the Public Health curriculum.