Following is a weekly listing of grants that have been awarded to UCA faculty and staff. Submissions made to UCA Today are posted the following Friday.
Dr. Jeff Whittingham, Dr. Shoudong Feng and Debbie Barnes, College of Education, were awarded a $5,000 grant from the Arkansas Department of Education for a minority teacher scholars program.
The grant will provide minority students with professional growth enhancement in the form of attending conferences and receiving professional materials. This matching grant is designed to assist the university in addressing the state?s minority teacher recruitment and retention program initiative.
Dr. John Bratton and Dr. Victor Puleo, College of Business Administration and Kim Bradford, Academic Outreach and Extended Programs, were awarded a $52,500 grant for the Insurance Education Institute from the Insurance Education Foundation.
The grant funds a course designed for high school teachers, counselors and administrators and community college instructors who teach insurance either as a specific course or as part of another subject. Its purpose is to enable teachers to become more effective in teaching insurance by providing the tools needed for understanding all forms of insurance, with an emphasis on the relevance to high school students and their families.
This grant benefits participants by funding a three-credit-hour, graduate-level insurance training course including tuition, room and board and educational materials. Ultimately it will benefit Arkansas high school students by providing practical contexts to assess the role of insurance in society.
Phil Bartos, College of Education, and Kim Bradford, Academic Outreach and Extended Programs, were awarded an $8,555 grant from the Arkansas Department of Emergency Management for a project to review local county emergency operations plans.
By Dec. 1, the emergency operation plans that have been submitted by local counties will have been adequately reviewed for ADEM.
The grant is in keeping with the university?s mission of providing public service and community outreach by working closely with colleges and faculty to coordinate the delivery of specially designed programs to meet the needs of business, industry and government.
Dr. Don Bradley, College of Business Administration, recently received a $6,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture through the Winrock International Institute.
The grant, Winrock International Institute for Agricultural Development, will help foster further international development of Arkansas small agribusinesses. Winrock is working in conjunction with the Southern United States Trade Association, which is trying to educate the public about various programs that they?ve designed to promote small agribusiness exports. Once Small Business Advancement National Center has built a database, they will use it to directly contact Arkansas small agribusinesses to determine whether they fit the various program eligibility requirements.
This is an economic development grant to further agribusiness exporting within the state of Arkansas, and will give students the opportunity to work with agribusiness community. When finished, this should create jobs and wealth for rural Arkansas.
