Innovative Technology and Education (ITE) Awards
ALL undergraduate and graduate students, postdoctoral researchers, full time faculty, and staff requiring technology-related equipment and/or software for student-based instruction and/or research are invited to apply for an URSA Innovative Technology and Education (ITE) Award of up to $5,000.
Funds for these awards come from a percentage of student fees.
2023-2024 Application Schedule
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Feb5
Accepting Applications February 5 - March 10, 2024
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Apr15
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June1
2024 ITE Award Spending Deadline
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Aug31
General Eligibility
- Degree-seeking UAF undergraduate students, graduate students, full time faculty, postdoctoral researchers, and staff from all disciplines and UAF campuses are eligible to apply. Regardless of applicant status, the project must support undergraduate learning.
- ÌÀÄ·ÊÓƵ Campuses Include: Bristol Bay, Chukchi, CTC, Troth Yeddha’, Interior Alaska, Kuskokwim, Northwest
- Applicants may only submit one proposal for each request for proposal (RFP).
- ITE funds may be awarded in addition to other URSA awards in any given academic year. ITE awardees may only receive an URSA ITE award two out of every three years. This policy allows for a greater number of students to receive awards with limited URSA funds.
Undergraduate Student Eligibility:
- Must be a Degree-seeking undergraduate student
Students of any year of study, from any ÌÀÄ·ÊÓƵ-affiliated campus, working toward an Occupational Endorsement, Certificate, Associate's Degree or Bachelor's Degree in any discipline are eligible to apply for and participate. Middle College students, graduated undergraduate students and graduate students are not eligible to apply. - Registration:
- Fall and Spring Awards: Students must be enrolled in at least 6 credits at any ÌÀÄ·ÊÓƵ-affiliated campus for the funded semester.
- Summer Awards: Students must be enrolled for at least 6 credits during the spring application semester and must plan to enroll in at least 6 credits for the fall semester following the award. Students who graduate in the spring term when the Summer Award opens are not eligible to apply.
- GPA of 2.3 or higher
Students with a GPA lower than 2.3 are not eligible. - Students that have received full funding from another ÌÀÄ·ÊÓƵ program for the same project are not eligible for additional funding from URSA (for example BLaST, INBRE, EPSCOR, Alaska Space Grant Program, amongst others) .
Mentor Eligibility:
- Faculty, post-doctoral researchers, graduate students, and staff may serve as URSA mentors and apply for the ITE award.
- Mentors must confirm their participation via the URSA Mentor Confirmation form prior to the award deadline.
- Mentor applicants must have at least one eligible undergraduate project participant identified prior to awarding.
- Awarded funds must be spent by June 1st of the awarded fiscal year.
- Mentors must complete the URSA Mentor Confirmation form prior to the application deadline.
- Awardees must complete a Reflection Form by the end of the award period.
- Final products to be submitted with the reflection form include:
- 2-3 high resolution pictures of awardee and undergraduate students engaging with ITE funded-materials
- IMPORTANT: Failure to submit a final evaluation or to submit final products will make the awardee ineligible to receive future URSA funding.
This award is for technology/education-related EQUIPMENT AND SOFTWARE only.
Ineligible expenses include: fellowship/ salary, travel, services, tuition, and registration fees.
For any given round of URSA funding, 25–70 proposals are submitted.
With limited funding we award between 8 and 12 proposals in each call. The competition is high.
- When an application period ends, ITE proposals will be distributed to the Dean of
the applicant’s listed discipline for review.
- Deans will evaluate the applications submitted from their College/School, score the
proposals, and provide comments using an established rubric.
- URSA funds submitted proposals in ranked order until the allotted amount of funding is distributed.
Award selections will be based on:
- Written quality of the proposal and purpose of the equipment/software.
- Direct benefit to the educational experience of undergraduate students (including
the number of students benefiting from the equipment/software).
- While the subject and results may contribute to an individual faculty member’s program
of instruction, research or creative scholarship, the use of technology-related equipment/software
must involve undergraduate and/or graduate students.
- Implementation schedule (all equipment/software will be the property of the awardee’s
department; therefore, the overseeing department must be identified in the proposal).
- Detailed list of equipment/software with specifications and costs (a copy of the cost
estimate from the manufacturer/supplier must be provided).
- Maintenance plan for the equipment/software.