St. Lawrence Awards Fall 2015 Innovation Grants
Now in its sixth year, St. Lawrence University announced the Fall 2015 Innovation Grant award recipients, which include health stations, reusable to-go boxes for Dana, a new Green Bikes repair stand, a Queer Peers program, a leadership summit for student athletes, a collection of Chinese books, and a new oven for Campus Kitchens.
Supported by the President’s Office, the Innovation Grants program began in 2010 to encourage initiatives that will improve the quality of life at St. Lawrence through curricular, co-curricular or campus life projects and provide a foundation for St. Lawrence’s future. Students, faculty and staff are eligible for the grants.
“Sustainability and diversity were themes among many proposals and are among our funded programs,” said Lisa Cania, vice president for community and employee relations. “The successful grants all have the potential to offer transformative, positive change to campus life.”
The deadline for Spring 2016 proposals is March 18, 2016.
Below are the winning proposals:
To-Go Container Token Program
Dana Dining Hall fills 11,880 disposable to-go containers every year, clogging St. Lawrence’s waste stream and costing the university excessive funds. Last year, Dining and Conference Services started a reusable to-go container pilot program, providing a limited number of students with green containers to be filled and returned to Dana. Starting in January 2016, Dining Services will expand the program campus-wide so that all students, faculty, and staff will be able to obtain free green containers, fillable and returnable at Dana.
SLU Stay Healthy Station
The Wellness Committee has discussed the concept of providing a blood-pressure monitoring station on campus to help raise awareness about this vital health indicator and make it quick and easy to self-monitor. St. Lawrence will contract with New York Blood Pressure, Inc., to provide a monitoring station, which in addition to blood pressure, can also assess heart rate, weight, body mass index (BMI) and vision (color blindness).
Green Bikes Repair Stand
There has been a steady increase in the biking community and circulation of Green Bikes on campus. As a result, increased demand for Green Bikes and bicycle-related infrastructure on campus prompt the need for third self-contained outdoor repair stand outside of the Owen D. Young Library. The Green Bikes program will also buy a Park Tools bike repair kit to be placed outside the library, similar to the kit located at Madill Hall, to service the Green Bikes fleet at that location.
Captain Leadership Summit
After recently completing a successful leadership training program this past August, 60 to 70 St. Lawrence student-athlete leaders will participate in the Captain Leadership Summit in May 2016. The summit enables participants to gain the knowledge and resources that will allow them to have the confidence and ability to assist their teams and groups to perform at their optimal level, understand the responsibilities that one carries in a position of leadership, and facilitate cross campus conversations such as sexual assault prevention, diversity and inclusion as well as additional student programming.
Queer Peers Program
The Queer Peers Program will support students’ positive sexual orientation, gender identity and successful transition to life at St. Lawrence University. Through peer-to-peer meetings in a safe and confidential environment, mentees drawn from all class years will connect and develop a rapport with Queer Peers mentors—students who identify as LGBTQ and are interested in assisting incoming or current students. Mentor training each semester will include cultural competency, negotiating identity, personal safety, leadership and mentorship. The program will ALSO offer informal social events, where LGBTQ students can meet for meals, movies, games, local excursion, and casual conversations.
Campus Kitchens Oven Safety
The Campus Kitchens Project works with St. Lawrence University’s Dining Services and local farmers to recycle left over food into hot, nutritious meals for approximately 50 community residents a week, most of who are children and senior citizens. This grant will purchase, install and use a new oven in the Eben Holden Kitchen facility, where the operation takes place. The purchase and installation of a new oven will benefit operations, expand the amount of food that can be prepared, and heat food to industry-standard food safe temperatures.
Building a Collection of Chinese Books
Campus diversity is one of the key factors affecting the quality of the St. Lawrence University student experience. In order to further support efforts towards enriching diversity on campus and broadening the multicultural environment at St. Lawrence, the Owen D. Young Library has accepted a donation of Chinese scholarly works. The Innovation Grant will support the cataloging of the gifts, allowing the collection to be available to students, faculty and staff as well as those at other academic institutions that St. Lawrence partners with for shared borrowing and to the local community.
