The University Alumni Association's Jefferson Trust awarded 13 grants, totaling $523,653, to University projects Friday.
Among this year's recipients were Women's Center Director Jennifer Merritt and Education Prof. Edith "Winx" Lawrence, who together received $50,000 for the "Young Women Leaders Program: The Sister-to-Sister Project," a yearlong mentoring program which pairs University women with girls in Albemarle County middle schools. Part of the funding received will go toward a project connecting Albemarle County middle school girls with girls from Cameroon.
"Some will go right to Cameroon ... the amount given will sustain the Cameroon supplies and materials for two years," Merritt said. "About three-fourths of the money will support development and coordination [for the middle-school mentoring program] here in the U.S."
The Jefferson Trust was created seven years ago as an alumni-funded endowment resource awarding grants annually to University projects which enhance "the University's margin of excellence consistent with the Founder's vision and its national and international reputation," according to its website.
The Jefferson Trust received and reviewed 40 grant applications this year, according to a University press statement released Friday. Wayne Cozart, executive director of the Jefferson Trust, said the organization looks to award initiatives which positively impact the University.
"We have given 75 grants over the last six years, and they have influenced almost every area of the community," Cozart said. "We look for a new initiative that will have a strong impact that will make the University better."
Kristin Morgan, program director for the Virginia-North Carolina Alliance for Minority Participation, received $32,200. The Virginia-North Carolina Alliance aims to increase the number of students, particularly minorities, earning degrees in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM).
"I applied for the grant because I wanted to expand the STEM Summer Research program to include a research track in biology, knowing that we have a significant number of Virginia-North Carolina Alliance students who are biology majors," Morgan said in an email.
Morgan said the program was important to the University because "U.Va. serves as a leader for its partner schools, offering research opportunities in world-class facilities with its faculty members to a diverse group of students who may come from less resourced campuses."
Cozart said the Jefferson Trust this year had $600,000 available but chose to award less than that. "Based on the amount available, we decide how much we can give," he said.
The Board of Trustees, composed of University alumni and parents who have donated at least $100,000 to the Alumni Association, determines the allocation of grant money.
"It's a great way to involve alumni in a way where they can actually make decisions," Cozart said. "We already have student self-governance, and alumni self-governance is something we try to promote"
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