FIPSE award for University Northside Partnership
A $750,000 Fund for the Improvement of Post-Secondary Education (FIPSE) grant was awarded to Senior Vice President Robert Jones and Associate Vice President Geoffrey Maruyama (professor, educational psychology), Co-Principal Investigators, to develop collaborations on the North side of Minneapolis as part of the University of Minnesota's Northside Partnership. The three-year grant, which begins in November, will be used to develop a new Urban Research and Outreach/Engagement Center (UROC) as a model of how urban research and land-grant universities can be more strategic, deliberate, and effective in their efforts to help urban communities resolve complex problems. The new UROC model will be adapted from the successful Research and Outreach Center model that has served primarily rural communities and is based upon a long-term University of Minnesota presence in the communities being served. It is designed to form long-term partnerships that are sustainable and jointly address key issues identified by the Northside community. Based upon extensive community input the first areas of concentration for the University and its community partners will be health, education, and economic development.