The grant will provide support for The Way Forward initiative, which offers grants to multi-campus partnerships for innovative projects that respond to current crises facing higher education.
Bringing Theory to Practice (BT2P), a national project headquartered at Elon University, has received a $150,000 grant from The Henry Luce Foundation in support of The Way Forward initiative.
The Way Forward offers grants to multi-campus partnerships for innovative projects that respond to the current crises facing higher education. Generous funding from The Endeavor Foundation, which supports BT2P’s work across numerous programs, helped to launch this multi-year initiative in 2020. This new award from the Luce Foundation allows BT2P to support nearly twice as many projects as originally planned, to build a community of practice among the awardees through multiple convenings, and to make public what we learn across higher education.
“We are thrilled to receive this funding from The Henry Luce Foundation,” said David Scobey, Director of Bringing Theory to Practice. “This award, along with the generous support of The Endeavor Foundation, enables BT2P to support projects that advance sustainable, radical change to improve education for all students. We’re especially committed to prioritizing the innovative work of public universities, community colleges, and minority-serving institutions. This award extends our capacity to offer such support.”
The Way Forward initiative began in fall 2020 as a response to the current intersecting crises facing American society and higher education – systemic racism, the pandemic, and economic inequality. The initiative fosters creative educational responses to the crises through two linked projects: Multi-Institutional Innovation Grants (MIGs) that bring the core values and best practices of undergraduate education to bear on the need for change; and a podcast series exploring the best paths forward with educational thought-leaders and innovators (starting winter 2021).
The Henry Luce Foundation seeks to enrich public discourse by promoting innovative scholarship, cultivating new leaders, and fostering international understanding. The Foundation advances its mission through grantmaking and leadership programs in the fields of higher education, public policy, religion and theology, art, and in Asia. The Endeavor Foundation seeks to support educational opportunity and transformative learning for undergraduates, especially through the support of liberal education.
BT2P is a community of educators dedicated to both the core purposes of higher education and to the need for its radical transformation. Since its founding in 2003, BT2P has funded hundreds of campus initiatives, hosted convenings for researchers and students, and released publications on educational innovation and institutional change. In 2020, BT2P moved to Elon University, a national leader in engaged, holistic education, after 15 years at the Association of American Colleges and Universities in Washington, DC.
BT2P’s work is grounded in three commitments: that undergraduate education should be holistic and transformative; that educating the whole student means including and supporting all students; and that these commitments require fundamental change that will reshape the student experience, academic institutions, and the relationship of higher education to the larger society. You can learn more about BT2P’s work at www.bttop.org.