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Grant News
Grant funding is an ever-changing world of new opportunities impacted by federal regulations, deadline extensions and a number of other factors. The grant news section will keep readers up-to-date on changes in funding opportunities, whether the grantor is a federal, state or local government agency or a corporate or private foundation.
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Trade Adjustment Assistance Community College and Career Training Grant (TAA CCCTG) Program
February 24, 2012 - Today, Secretary of Labor Hilda L. Solis announced a solicitation for a new round of grant applications for the $2 billion Trade Adjustment Assistance Community College and Career Training Grant (TAA CCCTG) Program. The announcement was made in conjunction with Second Lady Jill Biden's "Community College To Career" bus tour. The tour concluded today at Davidson County Community College in North Carolina where Dr. Biden was joined by Secretary Solis and Vice President Joe Biden.
The TAA CCCTG Program is authorized for $500 million for each of four years, fiscal years 2011 through 2014, to support educational and career-training programs focused on dislocated and unemployed workers. Each state will be guaranteed a minimum of 0.5% of the total funding, or $2.5 million per state per year. The Administration has emphasized the program as a key component of President Obama's goal of having the highest proportion of college graduates in the world by 2020 and helping to increase the number of workers who attain degrees, certificates, and other industry-recognized credentials.
Please follow this link to view a preview of the grant solicitation https://s3.amazonaws.com/public-inspection.federalregister.gov/2012-04258.pdf. The actual notification will be printed in the Federal Register on February 27th and is subject to change from the version linked above.
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Fund for Improvement of Postsecondary Education (FIPSE)
Unfortunately, FIPSE did not receive funding for FY 2012. $1 million in funding is designated to run a program Training for Real Time Writers -a program to assist court reporters. FIPSE is in the 2013 budget for $55m for a program called First In The World.
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Engineering Internships to Double in 2012
During an August 31, 2011 meeting of the President's Council on Jobs and Competitiveness, 44 companies pledged to create 6,300 new internships for engineering students in 2012.
The promise aims to retain students who have an early interest in engineering but are lost from the pipeline before graduating and entering the engineering workforce. As Science reports, "Only about 40% of students who declare an interest in engineering as freshmen wind up majoring in the field." And although college graduation levels in the U.S. have risen nearly 50 percent in the past decade according to National Center for Education Research statistics, the number of engineering graduates stalled at the level of 120,000 a year, a fraction of the one million engineering graduates per year in China and India.
Energy secretary Steven Chu has stated, "For America to stay competitive in the global market, we must train and retain the world's best engineers. Working together, private industry and the public sector can position the U.S. to continue to lead in science and innovation in the 21st century, creating good jobs and laying the foundation for a robust economy."
The companies joining the pledge to double their 2012 engineering internship opportunities include American Express, Boeing, Dell, DuPont, Facebook, and Intel. More corporations are expected to join the movement in the wake of the American Jobs Act proposed by the White House on September 12, 2011.
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