J.A. and Kathryn Albertson Foundation has awarded Albertson College of Idaho in Caldwell a $5 million per year Evergreen grant, plus an additional one-time $5 million grant to launch a $17 million fundraising campaign to renovate the school’s science facility.

The goal of both grants, according to university spokeswoman Beth Zborowski, is to support initiatives to help the college look more like a U.S. News & World Report Top 100 National Liberal Arts College.

The $5 million Evergreen grant replaces the final installment in a three-year, $17 million grant Albertson College received from the foundation in 2005. ACI already has received $12 million of that previous grant.

The new grant will be funded continually on a three-year cycle. Should the funding ever be canceled, the university will have a three-year warning, Zborowski said.

The grants have been used to invest in various departments such as biology, business and education, she said. Funding also is used in recruitment and scholarships and to give professors resources and enhance salaries.

ACI used some of the grant to expand the Albertson Heritage Scholarship — a full-tuition scholarship for students with outstanding high school records who also rank in top one percent of the ACT or SAT pool, said Zborowski.

The profile of this year’s freshmen was again the best in the state, with 40 percent ranking in the top 10 percent of their high school graduating class.

The top quarter of the freshman class was in the top 7 percent of the national ACT/SAT pool and had a high school grade-point average of 4.0 or better.

ACI president Bob Hoover said the grant “gives the college the financial stability to focus on long-term priorities” that will keep educational standards high.

The Boone Science Hall was constructed in 1967 and is nearly 80,000 square feet. The fundraising campaign will remodel and update the building’s infrastructure, classroom technology and laboratory spaces and equipment, said Zborowski.

“We believe with more national recognition and an increased focus on distinctive areas such as science education, ACI will continue to attract the best and brightest students from Idaho and elsewhere and give them the kind of experience which will lead them to remain and contribute to this state,” said ACI Trustee Kenneth C. Howell.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, November 21st, 2006 at 11:23 pm and is filed under College Grant, Education. Tags: College, Education, Grant, Scholarship, Student. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.