The Centennial Research Scholars Program

The Centennial Scholars Program is designed to accentuate the role of faculty and students as co-inquirers through the support of research activity. This program supports inquiry in projects using the methodologies or skills appropriate to a specific discipline, exploring current problems in social issues, questions of values, issues of institutional significance, and/or questions of importance in that discipline. The college expects to name up to three faculty members as Centennial Scholars each year; those faculty then choose two student co-inquirers who will collaborate with the faculty members on specific research projects. (See "Financial Support" below for details about benefits to faculty and students under the Centennial Scholars Program.)

The Centennial Classroom Research Program has two goals: to strengthen faculty inquiry and teaching by direct involvement in research into classroom teaching, and to strengthen student learning both through participation in the research and through establishing the best teaching and learning patterns in the classroom. Research projects involving curricular issues may also be included in the Classroom Research Program. The college expects to name one faculty member each year as a Centennial Classroom Research Scholar; that faculty member then chooses two student co-inquirers who will collaborate with him/her on specific research projects.

Financial Support: Centennial Research Scholars and Centennial Classroom Research Scholars will receive summer stipends of $2,000; stipends for teaching a summer school course to their two student co-inquirers; and one course release time during the following academic year. Student co-inquirers are paid summer stipends of $2,000 each and receive remission of summer school tuition for the course they take with the Faculty Scholar. A limited amount of funding is available for project materials to use in research.

Faculty Research Scholars under both of these programs agree to complete the equivalent of two months’ full-time work on their research projects during the summer, with no other commitments during this time such as teaching summer school classes or participating in workshops, and also to work for an amount of time during the academic year appropriate to the time released. Scholars will complete a research-based paper in a style appropriate for a professional journal in the researchers’ discipline; this paper will be published in Teaching and Research at Concordia College. It will also serve as the basis for a public lecture to be given in the academic year following the grant period. Final stipends of $500 are awarded upon completion of the lecture and submission of the paper.

The Centennial Individual Research Scholars Program supports research activity conducted individually by faculty members in their own academic disciplines. Projects which use the methodologies or skills appropriate to a specific discipline, exploring current problems in social issues, questions of values, issues of institutional significance, and/or questions of importance in that discipline can be funded through this program.

Historically faculty members have done their research in the summer months, receiving a stipend of $3,000. However, faculty may elect instead to take one course of release time during the academic year to provide space in their schedules to conduct their research.

A limited amount of funding is available for project materials. If taking the summer-stipend option, Individual Research Scholars agree to complete the equivalent of two months’ work on their research projects during the summer, without teaching or other responsibilities such as workshops or seminars. Individual Scholars will also prepare a report on their work for publication in Teaching and Research at Concordia College or prepare an exhibit on their work for public view no later than the end of the first semester following the grant period. Faculty receiving summer stipends will be awarded a final $500 stipend upon completion of this requirement.

Application forms for Centennial Grants

Centennial Scholars Program

Classroom Research Program

Individual  Research Program

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