Campus Recipients Announced to Receive Over $1.5 Million for STEM Research

WASHINGTON – The Council for Christian Colleges & Universities (CCCU) and Scholarship & Christianity in Oxford (SCIO), the CCCU’s U.K. subsidiary have announced the nine institutions who will receive over $1.5 million total in grant funding as part of Supporting Structures: Innovative Collaborations to Enhance STEM Research at CCCU Member Institutions, a project designed to support and enhance STEM research among faculty and students at CCCU campuses.

Nine CCCU institutions were selected to receive grants worth up to nearly $ 192,500 each to support multi-faceted projects on their campuses that will incorporate training, support, and events for faculty members, students, senior administrators, and the communities that feed into and support these institutions. Through the Supporting Structures grant program, the institutions will expand research opportunities among existing, pre-tenure faculty members in the STEM fields on these campuses and offer training in webinars and in person at summer seminars at hosted by SCIO in Oxford to deepen their understanding of and engagement with issues pertaining to science, religion, and society. Additionally, the project has a specific fund dedicated to help participating campuses enhance diversity among their STEM faculty.

“The selection committee was pleased to see so many high-quality applications from across the CCCU membership and had the difficult choice of selecting the nine deserving institutions,” says Stanley P. Rosenberg, the CCCU’s vice president for research and scholarship and SCIO’s founder and executive director. “Indeed, what was evident is that many CCCU members are committed to doing innovative and thoughtful work in STEM fields, making a place for and attracting excellent younger scholars, and contributing to students and their communities in significant ways. We are delighted to be working with them and grateful to the funding agencies for enabling us to make this sort of strategic investment.”

The institutions selected represent a broad geographic swath in the U.S., from Washington to Texas to Massachusetts, and include one Canadian institution:

• Abilene Christian University (Abilene, TX)
• Azusa Pacific University (Azusa, CA)
• Calvin University (Grand Rapids, MI)
• Dordt University (Sioux Center, IA)
• Gordon College (Wenham, MA)
• Seattle Pacific University (Seattle, WA)
• Trinity Western University (Langley, British Columbia)
• Wheaton College (Wheaton, IL)
• Whitworth University (Spokane, WA)

Not only will this project provide campuses with vital funding to advance scientific research and support newer STEM faculty in the wake of a global pandemic, it will also bolster unique partnerships between these CCCU institutions and major research institutions, with CCCU faculty members undertaking research projects in research laboratories at R1 universities or comparable institutions. The project will also provide funding for campuses to establish student clubs and support undergraduate student researchers in STEM fields, as well as provide opportunities for administrators and other campus-connected communities to engage science, religion, and society issues.

Supporting Structures is made possible through funding provided by the John Templeton Foundation and the M.J. Murdock Charitable Trust. For more information about the project, visit www.scio-uk.org/research/supporting-stem/.