Lumina Foundation announces grants

[from Philanthropy News Digest]

The Indianapolis-based Lumina Foundation for Education has announced grants totaling $15.4 million to eleven organizations in eight states and the District of Columbia working to enhance student preparation, success, and productivity in higher education.

First-quarter recipients include the San Francisco-based Tides Center, which was awarded two grants totaling $8.15 million to assist Lumina with its multistate, multiyear productivity initiative. Other grants included $1 million to the D.C.-based Aspen Institute to create the Aspen Prize for Community College Excellence; $425,000 to the Chicago-based Higher Learning Commission to explore the applicability and usefulness of the Degree Qualifications Profile through the Open Pathways accreditation affirmation process; and $200,000 to Complete College America in Zionsville, Indiana, to assist state consortia in the development of strong Community College and Career Training Grant (C3TG) applications. In addition, the foundation awarded $200,000 in strategic planning support to the United Negro College Fund in Fairfax, Virginia.

"The key to our nation's long-term economic success is a twenty-first century labor force, one with adaptable workers who possess the kinds of high-level skills and relevant knowledge that can only be offered in well-designed and rigorous postsecondary programs," said Lumina Foundation president and CEO Jamie Merisotis. "That's why the Big Goal — that by the year 2025, 60 percent of working-age Americans will hold high-quality college degrees or credentials — is all about ensuring that many more students enroll in and complete such programs, which is the focus of the deserving organizations that Lumina granted dollars to in the first quarter."

“Lumina Foundation Announces 2011 First-Quarter Grants.” Lumina Foundation for Education Press Release 4/18/11.