New York, NY – Project Pericles is proud to announce the launch of the Periclean Grants Program, a multi-tiered initiative designed to help member campuses move community-engaged civic learning from isolated efforts toward sustained institutional practice embedded across curricula, policies, and campus culture.
The initiative includes two grant opportunities: the Periclean Catalyst Grants ($10,000) and the Periclean Faculty Leader (PFL) Course Grants ($3,000 and $5,000.) Together, the programs recognize that lasting civic learning requires both innovative teaching and the institutional infrastructure necessary to sustain and scale that work over time.
In addition to funding, all grantees will contribute to a broader shared learning network across the Periclean consortium. Throughout the school year, they will participate in workshops, reflective resources, campus conversations, and dissemination of tools and practices that other institutions can adapt.
“The faculty and staff leading this work rarely lack ideas,” said Sanda Balaban, Executive Director of Project Pericles. “They lack time, money, and the institutional support to make good ideas stick. We designed this grant program to fund both: powerful community-engaged civic learning courses and the policies, partnerships, and people to power them and to keep them going after the grant ends.”
The Periclean Catalyst Grants supports Periclean campuses pursuing systems-level initiatives that embed community-engaged civic learning into institutional structures such as departments, governance processes, curricular pathways, and faculty support systems. Catalyst grantee projects include creating a faculty pedagogy fellowship program to help achieve community-engagement strategic plan goals, a campus-wide civil dialogue initiative, a Community Data Hub ethically connecting faculty, students, and community organizations through data-focused community-engaged courses.
Complementing this institutional focus, the Periclean Faculty Leader Course Grants support faculty in developing or redesigning undergraduate courses that place civic inquiry, democratic participation, and community engagement at the center of academic learning. Courses have one (or more) themes: Community-Engaged Learning, Civic Identity & Participation, and Building Bridges Across Difference.
The Periclean Grants Program was shaped in collaboration with Project Pericles’ Program Directors’ Council and responds directly to common challenges identified by consortium campuses, including limited faculty and staff capacity, competing institutional priorities, and the need to sustain and scale civic learning.
Catalyst Project Leads, Campus, and Projects:
- Lindsay Johnson-Walton, Ann Duncan, Bill Harder, and Maxwell Greenberg, Goucher College (Baltimore, Maryland): “Community-Based Learning and Community Building Behind the Wall.”
- Darby Ray, Morgan Kinney, and Laurie Baker, Bates College (Lewiston, Maine): “Community-Engaged Data Hub.”
- Derek Johnson and Ruth Janisch, Macalester College (St. Paul, Minnesota): “Community Engagement Center Faculty Fellowship.”
- Jessica Cowan and Erin Dolgoy, Rhodes College (Memphis, Tennessee): “Civil Dialogue Advocacy Project.”
- Jennie Sweet-Cushman, Chatham University (Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania): “Civic Engagement Pedagogy Fellows Program.”
- Lauren O’Neill Shermer, Jim Vike, Wes Leckrone, and Jessica McNamara, Widener University (Chester, Pennsylvania): “Institutionalizing Civic Learning: A Comprehensive Framework for Civic Engagement and Leadership Development.”
PFL Grant Awardees
- Annie Karreth, Ursinus College (Collegeville, Pennsylvania): “APEX-89: Civic Spark Policy Lab.”
- Dorcas E. McCoy, Bethune-Cookman University (Daytona Beach, Florida): “POL 499 Senior Seminar: Civic Story Lab – Democracy, Community, and Public Problem Solving.”
- Elise A. Mitchell, Swarthmore College (Swarthmore, Pennsylvania): “HIST 055: The Black History of Public Health in Philadelphia.”
- Stephen Mohring, Carleton College (Northfield, Minnesota): “Habitats and Humanity: Considering Built Spaces.”
- Bev Johnson, Bates College (Lewiston, Maine): “Environmental Geochemistry (EACS 240).”
- Kate Duffly, Reed College (Portland, Oregon): “Taking it to the Streets: Processions, Puppets and Protest Performance.”
- Sarah Cunningham, Pace University (New York, New York): “ART 180: Introduction to Museum and Curatorial Studies.”
- Erik W. Davis, Macalester College (Saint Paul, Minnesota): “How to Get to Nirvana.”
- Courtney Walton, Allegheny College (Meadville, Pennsylvania): “African American Literature/Black Studies 236.”
- Madhavi Vishnubhotla, The New School (New York, New York): “Quantitative Reasoning I (LMTH 1950).”
About Project Pericles
Project Pericles is a higher education nonprofit organization dedicated to bringing civic learning to the heart of higher education. Through curricular innovation, faculty leadership, and community-engaged learning, Project Pericles works to make democratic engagement a core component of undergraduate education.
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MEDIA CONTACT: Harry Patton Hou
Program Manager