A List
5/2/05

SLU AWARDED MELLON FOUNDATION GRANT FOR ARTS CURRICULUM

CANTON – St. Lawrence University has been awarded a grant of $250,000 from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, New York City, to advance and integrate the arts curriculum. The grant will be implemented over three years.

The grant will allow faculty in the departments of fine arts, music and speech and theatre, as well as the staff of the Richard F. Brush Art Gallery, to implement an aggressive curricular plan developed to bring students and faculty together across the arts disciplines to collaborate in dynamic and innovative ways.

As planned, the grant will assist with funding two new positions, director of arts technology and an arts academic technician. In addition, the award will support curriculum development in the arts through funding for faculty training; conference travel; professional development opportunities; and the establishment of a Collaborative Projects Fund, to provide assistance for work by students and faculty across the arts disciplines, awarded on a competitive basis.

The curriculum development is also being supported by the renovation and refurbishment of the University's arts facilities, already under way.

"What we are seeking is to achieve nothing less than an educational renaissance at the University by improving and expanding both the facilities for the arts and the opportunities for collaborative work by faculty and students," said St. Lawrence President Daniel F. Sullivan. "We are extremely grateful to The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation for its support of this exciting venture. We look forward to courses in digital arts, and most importantly, to more collaborative work among all of the arts departments. Along with newly available shared space, music, theatre, film and fine arts students and faculty will be able to work together on projects in ways that have not heretofore been possible at St. Lawrence."

The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation has provided St. Lawrence with a number of generous grants over the past three decades, all of which have enabled the institution to think creatively about how to enhance the curriculum in new and innovative ways. Examples in recent years include grant support for development of the ConnectNY consortium of academic libraries, support for the establishment of the Center for Teaching and Learning, and awards to initiate the University's Technology for Teaching Project and its Cultural Encounters Program.

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