The Program for Leadership and Character offers four sources of funding for faculty and/or staff efforts to support WFU students’ development as leaders of character. These programs include: 1) Departmental Grants; 2) Course Development and Redesign Grants; 3) Travel for Interdisciplinary and Community Engaged Learning (TICEL) Grants; and 4) Co-Sponsorships.
Departmental Grants
NOTE: Applications for Departmental Grants are currently closed.
Departmental grants fund creative faculty and staff efforts to provide leadership and character development opportunities to students and/or develop their own expertise as character and leadership educators. Major gifts from the Lilly Endowment and the Kern Family Foundation fund this program.
Who may apply: faculty or staff from WFU departments, programs, centers, etc.
Grant amount: up to $3000 per year
Example uses of funds:
- Honoraria and/or travel for visiting speakers with expertise on character and leadership education in a particular discipline
- Workshops or colloquia on character and leadership development
- Films, discussions, field trips, museum visits, performances, etc. related to character and leadership
- Costs to attend a character and leadership focused conference, for students, faculty, or staff
- Costs to present character and leadership focused research at a conference, for students, faculty, or staff
- Funding to pay student research assistants to pursue character and leadership related projects
- Incentives students participating in applied research related to character and leadership
Key Dates:
Applications due April 21, 2023
Recipients notified May 8, 2023
Funds dispersed mid July
Funds must be spent by June 30, 2024
Post-grant reports due December 1, 2023 (mid-year report) and July 1, 2024 (final report)
Grant requirements:
- Complete application
- For School of Law faculty only: hold consultative planning meeting with Nancy Winfrey (winfren@wfu.edu)
- Notify Program for Leadership and Character contact person (see below) when your event will be held so that communications staff can take pictures, video, etc.
- Undertake activities outlined in application, utilizing grant funds
- Submit post-grant report (see post-grant report template here)
- Activities must be completed within one year (by June 30, 2024)
For more information:
UNDERGRADUATE FACULTY should contact Kathleen Stimely (mckeekl@wfu.edu) Director, Program Administration for the Program for Leadership and Character
PROFESSIONAL AND GRADUATE SCHOOL FACULTY should contact Nancy Winfrey (winfren@wfu.edu), Assistant Director of Curriculum and Pedagogical Design for the Program for Leadership and Character in the Professional Schools
Course Development and Redesign Grants
NOTE: Applications for Course Development and Redesign Grants are currently closed.
Course Development and Redesign Grants compensate faculty for spending significant time during their summer breaks to 1) deepen their expertise in character-development pedagogy and 2) generate a new course or revise an existing course to better support students’ growth as people and leaders of character. Grant awardees attend a 3-day in person summer workshop hosted by the Program for Leadership and Character in partnership with the Center for the Advancement of Teaching. In the weeks following the workshop, grant awardees give and receive peer feedback for their character development learning outcomes, assessments, and activities before submitting a syllabus and final grant report in late summer. Grant awardees will also have an option to participate in a year-long community of practice for character education (participation is a benefit but not a requirement of the CDRG program). Applications are encouraged from faculty who wish to approach character-development from a variety of disciplines, professions, traditions, or perspectives. Applicants who received grants last year may apply again, though priority will be given to first-time applicants. Major gifts from the Lilly Endowment and Kern Family Foundation fund this program.
Who may apply: Any WFU faculty
Grant amounts:
- $1000 for redesigning an existing course to incorporate a character-development learning outcome, a learning assessment, and learning activity
- $4000 for new courses the central focus of which is character-development or character-based leadership development
Key Dates:
Applications due by April 21, 2023
Recipients notified by May 8, 2023
Pre-survey due by July 9, 2023
Course Development and Redesign Workshop, on the Reynolda Campus, July 10-12, 2023
First draft of revised/new syllabus and grant report due by July 26, 2023
Peer feedback due to two other grant awardees by August 9, 2023
Final draft of revised/new syllabus and grant report due by August 23, 2023
Post-survey due by August 23, 2023
Funds dispersed by (depending on fulfillment of the grant requirements) August 23
Three Community of Practice lunch and learns, TBD scheduled for AY 2023-2024
Grant requirements:
- Complete application
- Complete pre-survey by July 9, 2023
- Attend Course Development and Redesign Workshop in person on the Reynolda Campus, July 10-12, 2023
- Submit first draft of revised/new syllabus and grant report by July 26, 2023
- Provide peer feedback to two other grant awardees via email by August 9, 2023
- Submit final draft of revised/new syllabus and grant report by August 23, 2023
- Complete post-survey by August 23, 2023
- Teach new or revised course within 2 academic years
For questions regarding stipend payment, contact Britney Jenkins, (jenkinb@wfu.edu), Administrative Assistant.
For questions regarding workshop content, contact Elizabeth Whiting Pierce, (piercee@wfu.edu), Director of Interdisciplinary and Engaged Learning in the Professional Schools for the Program for Leadership and Character
Travel for Interdisciplinary and/or Community Engaged Learning (TICEL) Grant
The Travel for Interdisciplinary and Community-Engaged Learning Travel (TICEL) Grant funds course-based travel for students in the professional schools. The ultimate goal of the TICEL grant is to educate professionals who recognize complex social problems in their communities, feel motivated to address those problems, and possess the professional and personal competencies to address them. These problems–like high maternal mortality rates, economic immobility, food deserts, etc.–transcend any one profession’s normal institutional scope (i.e. the court system for attorneys, healthcare systems for physicians, congregations for clergy). Resolving them requires collaboration across professions. Hands-on, experiential learning activities beyond the classroom setting can support students’ development as leaders with collaborative problem-solving capacities. However, these learning experiences can be expensive, involving costs for transportation, lodging, food, etc.. The TICEL grant exists to offset the cost of these learning activities for WFU professional and graduate students. Faculty apply for funds to cover expenses resulting from students’ travel (including the faculty person’s own travel expenses). These funds can be paid to students in the form of stipends (as a form of financial aid) or can be used to pay directly for the costs of learning activity (for instance, paying for hotel rooms during a weekend trip). A major gift from the Kern Family Foundation funds this program.
Who may apply: faculty in the WFU professional schools (law, divinity, business, medicine and/or engineering) and graduate schools
Grant amount: up to $1000 per student for up to 30 students per year
Key Dates:
October 26, 2023 (applications will reopen in spring 2024)
Recipients notified by November 9, 2023
Funds dispersed: varies by project
Fund spent by June 30, 2024 OR June 30, 2025 (depending on funds dispersal date)
Post-grant reports due by July 1, 2024 or July 1, 2025 (depending on funds dispersal date)
Grant requirements:
- Prepare to submit a strong application by engaging 1-2 resources in this folder and/or holding a planning meeting with Elizabeth Whiting Pierce or Nancy Winfrey (contact information below)
- Complete application
- Utilize grant funds to complete activities outlined in application
- Submit post-grant report
For more information: School of Law faculty should contact Nancy Winfrey, (winfren@wfu.edu), Assistant Director of Curriculum and Pedagogy in the Professional Schools for the Program for Leadership and Character. School of Business, Divinity, and Medicine, the Department of Engineering, and the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences faculty should contact Elizabeth Whiting Pierce, (piercee@wfu.edu), Director of Interdisciplinary and Engaged Learning in the Professional Schools for the Program for Leadership and Character.
Co-Sponsorships
Co-sponsorships fund creative faculty, staff, and student efforts to provide leadership and character opportunities through conferences, speaker series, and other events. Major gifts from the Lilly Endowment and the Kern Family Foundation fund this program.
Who may apply: Faculty in the Wake Forest Schools of Business, Divinity, Law, and Medicine, the Department of Engineering, and the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences
Grant amount: $250-$1000
Key Dates:
Requests reviewed at the first of every month
Please apply 30 to 60 days before your event for best consideration.
Grant requirements:
- Complete application here
- Use the Program’s logo on your advertisement
- Send any advertisements to our communications team, Jeremy Markovich (markovj@wfu.edu) and Sydney Bowman (sbowman@wfu.edu), so that we can distribute it to our network.
- Track participants (student/faculty/staff) and send that at the completion of the event to Kathleen Stimely (mckeekl@wfu.edu) and Britney Jenkins, (jenkinb@wfu.edu).
For more information, contact Britney Jenkins, (jenkinb@wfu.edu), Administrative Assistant.
For fall of 2023, the Program especially invites proposals from professional and graduate school faculty and staff on the theme of “Honesty and Authenticity in Leadership”