Augsburg Receives Two GEER Grants for Equity in Education and Remote Learning Needs

Minnesota state logoThe Education Department (Dr. Audrey Lensmire) and the Information Technology Department (Scott Krajewski) are the recipients of two new grants from the State of Minnesota which total $250,000. The Governor’s Emergency Education Relief (GEER) grant awards will address equity in education and technology and remote learning needs among students of color, Indigenous students, and those who are disabled or low-income. 

Lensmire’s GEER grant will provide direct aid to teacher candidates who have a need to defray unexpected costs posed by the pandemic during their student teaching semester and coursework.  Krajewski’s GEER grant will ensure that students receive the hardware and software required for meeting course learning objectives, and will provide captioning on instructional video recordings in order to make them more accessible. 

The grant awards will result in students and faculty being able to weather changes to their plans for learning and teaching a bit more smoothly. We owe thanks to the Minnesota Office of Higher Education for administering the competitive selection process this summer. We also wish to thank Dr. Lauren Causey for her skillful guidance in creating two high quality GEER proposals. 

The GEER grant program is a redistribution of federal CARES Act funds.

$150,000 Bush Foundation Grant Builds Capacity to Support Diversity in Teaching

Augsburg College’s Department of Education was recently awarded a $150,000 grant from the Bush Foundation as part of their Teacher Effectiveness Initiative (TEI) to support diversity in teaching. Augsburg was one of five schools selected to receive this one time award. Dr. Peg (Margaret) Finders, Chair and Associate Professor of Education, will lead the project in partnership with Minneapolis Public Schools (MPS), Minneapolis Community and Technical College (MCTC), and St. Paul Public Schools.

The goal of the project is to build capacity to recruit and support students of color moving through multiple educational institutions towards a degree in teaching. The team will create a coordinated, sustainable infrastructure that will reduce attrition and recruit high quality teacher candidates. The new infrastructure will help the partner institutions foster smooth transitions into teaching, engage in proactive recruitment of teacher candidates of color from multiple entry points, and improve experiences for teacher candidates of color.

This project builds on strengths of the Education departments’ East African Student to Teacher program and Special Education program.