TCU doubles max grant award for colloborative programs

Tri-College University has doubled the maximum grant amount for students, staff and faculty applying for its annual collaborative grant.

Members of Concordia College, North Dakota State University and Minnesota State University Moorhead can apply for grants to help start a new program, which involves members from at least two of the three campuses.

Tim Flakoll, the Provost of TCU, says the maximum amount of the award increased from $1,000 to $2,000 this year and that the lowest amount given has been $250. The newer aspects of the program are brought by the applicants and their ideas for programs.

“The newness comes from those that apply” Flakoll said.

Grants can be awarded between $200-$2,000 according to a TCU press release.

The purpose of the TCU collaborative grant program is to give collaborative opportunities to members of the campus community who share interests and goals.

TCU is looking for new programs and ideas that need financial help to begin.

“Projects or programs that haven’t been done or haven’t been tried before,” Flakoll said. “Someone who has a new idea… we want to have this [grant award] as a launch pad in essence, for programs that may be ongoing…or a one time opportunity.”

According to the press release there have been successful collaborations in the four years the program has been available.

Previous grant winners include a women’s collegiate lacrosse club and the design of an electronics lab manual used by physics and engineering students across tri-college campuses.

One usage of the grant money was setting up a wireless Internet service called “Eduroam” across all three campuses. The origin of the name is from education and roam. This wifi allows members of campus to register at their home campus and use the same Internet service at CC, MSUM, NDSU and possibly other universities internationally who are using the network.

Visitors between campuses will no longer have to create separate wireless access accounts for each campus or request a visitor log in code at another campus.

Daniel Heckaman, the CIO and director of technology at MSUM, was quoted in a TCU press release in regards to the potential of Eduroam.

“Eduroam allows our students to stay connected throughout their studies locally and abroad.  Connectivity is a key component to the learning process,” Heckaman said.

NDSU and CC already have Eduroam and MSUM will install it this fall.

Flakoll says applicants should be aware that TCU is not looking to fund projects that already have major funding or could find grants elsewhere through their own departments.

“We would like to be a significant portion of the overall expenditure. We don’t want to have our 2,000 be part of 200,000,” Flakoll said.

According to Flakoll, an Angels on Wings program was discussed. Even though it did not come to fruition it is a good example of the type of collaboration TCU is looking for.

“One thing we talked about was an Angels on Wings riding program at the equine center… but also work with students at MSUM who are going into social work that deal with children who have physical or mental challenges and give them an expanded opportunity.”

In this scenario students across campuses would be sharing resources and creating an opportunity for real world training they could not supply alone.

Flakoll says the programs awarded must be acceptable to all campuses. TCU does not want to misuse grant dollars.

“We don’t do anything partisan politics wise. So if people are thinking about let’s have a rally for so and so…not happening,” Flakoll says.

Students who wish to apply must submit a grant application explaining the details of their program.

The application deadline is October 15, 2012. For more information go to: http://www.tri-college.org/tcu_program_criteria_how_to_apply/