Grant from the Mellon Foundation will aid College’s new strategic plan
The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation has awarded Lafayette a three-year grant of $300,000 to support the Faculty Career Enhancement Project as part of the College’s in-depth strategic planning process. The grant, running Oct. 1, 2007 through Sept. 31, 2010, will support faculty innovation and collaboration at Lafayette.
The Mellon Foundation grant will help meet the faculty support goals of the College’s new strategic plan and will facilitate other strategic initiatives, especially in the arts, community-based learning and research, global studies, and life sciences (environmental studies), with emphasis on the humanities and social sciences.
The grant will serve three major purposes. It will energize faculty to engage in the present challenges of pedagogy and research. The grant will allow the College to begin implementing the many cross-disciplinary and collaborative elements of the strategic plan. It will also increase travel awards to keep subsidies in line with Lafayette’s peer institutions and to give more faculty members the opportunity to conduct in-depth work away from campus.
Wendy Hill, provost and dean of the faculty, will oversee the Faculty Career Enhancement Project. She will be assisted by David Johnson, associate provost, and Howard Bodenhorn, professor of economics and business and director of research services.
“The grant will help to turn aspects of the vision of the strategic plan into practice,” says Hill. “The main goal of the project is to enhance the professional development opportunities for our faculty. This could take the form of support for research, fieldwork, publishing, and the development of new courses.”
This is the second grant Lafayette has received from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation this year.
The Mellon Foundation’s Liberal Arts Colleges Program provides multi-year grants to liberal arts colleges across the country. Lafayette is one of approximately 67 liberal arts colleges that receive direct support through this program. The foundation’s Faculty Career Enhancement initiative supports the professional needs of faculty members across the distinct stages of a professorial career.