SCC faculty members receive mini-grants

Five Southwestern Community College faculty members recently received “Beyond the Classroom” mini-grants from Verizon to help their students engage in learning experiences outside the normal academic environment.

Begun in 2003, the mini-grant program funds costs associated with travel, lodging, per diem for students to attend workshops, conferences, training and seminars. Faculty costs associated with accompanying students to these events are also eligible. Significantly, the participants must also acquire matching dollars through fund raising.

One faculty member, English as a Second Language instructor, Lina Krisciokaityte, chose to develop a project through which 20 students at the SCC Cherokee Center took part in special studies of Cherokee folklore and symbols in the classroom, through visits to the Museum of the Cherokee Indian and through a classroom visit by and discussion with a guest archivist.

SCC instructors, left to right, Gary Dillard, Meg Rollins, Penny Wells and Peter Messier received “Beyond the Classroom” Verizon mini-grants to fund student learning experiences. Not pictured: Lina Krisciokaityte.

The four others receiving the grants chose to take their students to professional conferences in their fields.

Respiratory therapy instructors Gary Dillard and Terri McQuiddy sought funds to enable eight students to attend the NC Society of Respiratory Care State Meeting last September in Charlotte.

Health Information Technology instructor Penny Wells and 12 students will attend the North Carolina HI Management Association 56th annual meeting in Charlotte in May.

Radiography instructor Meg Rollins and the college’s second year radiography students chose to attend the Student-Educator Radiologic Technology Seminar, held in February by the Atlanta Society of Radiologic Technologists.

Peter Messier, coordinator for SCC’s surveying technology program, and 12 of his students traveled to Winston-Salem to attend the NC Society of Surveyors, Inc., 42nd annual convention.

At all the conferences students attended sessions and were able to interact with professionals in their proposed career fields.

Matching funds were raised by the students in a number of ways including securing donations from area businesses, fund raising raffles, car washes, candy and cake sales, and dues to their clubs.

For more information about the participating SCC programs, visit www.southwesterncc.edu.

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