DOE awards Erskine $3M grant
Erskine College was recently awarded a $3 million grant through the Department of Education’s Strengthening Institutions Program. The award, called the Erskine Forward grant, will provide support in a wide variety of areas, with funds made available over a five-year period.
“First and foremost, we give thanks to God for His gracious provision and continued faithfulness to Erskine College,” says Erskine Provost Dr. Edward Clavell.
Erskine’s president, Dr. Steve Adamson, says the grant’s impact will reach well beyond Due West.
“It will strengthen our ability to prepare teachers and healthcare professionals whose work will touch lives far beyond our campus,” he says. “We receive this opportunity with gratitude to God and a deep sense of responsibility.”
Grant funding will be used in a range of Erskine initiatives, including physical structures—such as lab renovations and education classroom tools—and accompanying support structures, such as tutoring and counseling services. There will also be a robust emphasis on workplace readiness in a rapidly changing job market.
The tenets of the Erskine Forward grant include:
• Strengthening workforce-aligned academic pathways in education, nursing, and allied health fields.
• Improving student success, persistence, and completion through comprehensive academic support services.
• Expanding workforce readiness and experiential learning through internships, clinical placements, student-teaching experiences, mentoring, and employer partnerships.
• Enhancing institutional capacity through strategic investments in healthcare training facilities, simulation technologies, instructional equipment, and workforce development infrastructure.
Throughout the five-year project period, the grant will establish measurable outcomes related to student success, program development, experiential learning, workforce preparation, and institutional capacity.
“This award is an extraordinary opportunity for Erskine College and an important affirmation of the work already underway across our institution,” Clavell says, noting his gratitude for the work of Marygrove Consulting, which helped to develop and submit the grant proposal.
“This is a landmark investment in Erskine’s future and in the students, we are called to serve,” Dr. Adamson says. “As we expand academic opportunities and strengthen student support, our Christian mission remains at the heart of our work: equipping men and women for lives of service and leadership, prepared to serve their neighbors with knowledge, skill, integrity, and compassion.”
