Recently, a Holland Sentinel new story featured the phenomenal work and large sums of external funds secured by Hope faculty for undergraduate research. And the numbers, and people, are impressive.
“Hope’s Research Footprint: $9.9 in Use for Faculty, Undergrad Studies” highlights Dr. Courtney Peckens and her research project on sound quality in the new Jack H. Miller Center for Musical Arts while also making note of these facts:
- In the past decade, Hope College faculty have garnered 405 research grants totaling $32.77 million.
- On average, Hope faculty research and scholarships draw in $2 million in external funding annually.
- For the 2015-16 fiscal year that ends June 30, Hope’s faculty have secured $1.5 million out of the $5 million in external research grants that they’ve requested — and are on track to hit the $2 million mark again.
- Grants come from between 30 and 50 sources that range in all sizes from $5,000 to half a million dollars.
In this story, Karen Nordell Pearson, associate dean of research and scholarship at Hope, summarily noted this about the strength of Hope’s research agendas:
“All of our 244 full-time faculty are involved in work as scholars, artists and teachers. Their scholarly work varies from what might be considered traditional ‘research’ such as laboratory discoveries to publishing books and articles on wide ranges of topics to creative works that artists, musicians and writers produce… Faculty are amazingly adept in figuring out how undergraduates can contribute even in those circumstances. I give them so much credit for figuring out how to integrate undergrads.”