Skidmore College nets $2M in grants to boost curriculum

SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. » Skidmore College is receiving nearly $2 million in grants to boost its curriculum, with a focus on program advancements in the documentary studies and science departments.

The school’’s John B. Moore Documentary Studies Collaborative (MDOCS) has received a $798,000 grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation to foster enduring community partnerships and documentary projects.

The four-year grant is the latest in a series of awards from the foundation to the college since 1970 that have together exceeded $9 million.

“At the heart of this initiative, generously funded by the Andrew Mellon Foundation, is the concept of co-creation — that professional documentarians and members of the Skidmore community partner with community organizations to use documentary as a means of addressing important issues that affect our region,” Adam Tinkle,

director of MDOCS and assistant professor of media and film studies, said in a press release. “We are grateful for the opportunities for community partnerships, innovative learning and new approaches to documentary that this funding supports.”

The program builds on MDOCS’ record of sustainable, impactful documentary initiatives with the community. Recent partnerships have included work with the Saratoga County Economic Opportunity Council’s (SCEOC) Latino Community Advocacy Program and a separate project with a coalition of community groups (SHARE/Sheridan Hollow Alliance for Renewable Energy) that advocated for environmental justice for a predominantly Black community in Albany.

The latest Mellon Foundation grant, which continues through 2024, will support MDOCS faculty and staff positions and provide support for grants to community organizations. The scale of MDOCS’ resources and opportunities for documentary production are unique among liberal arts colleges.

The grant will also help to infuse documentary production experiences into Skidmore’s new General Education curriculum, which received previous support from the Mellon Foundation and goes into effect this fall.

Additionally, an award of approximately $500,000 through

the Sherman Fairchild Foundation’s Scientific Equipment Program and two grants totaling nearly $600,000 from the National Science Foundation come at a pivotal moment for sciences at Skidmore. As the number of science majors at Skidmore has doubled over the past decade, the college’s new Center for Integrated

Sciences (CIS) will support the conviction that scientific literacy is essential in today’s society and will drive the careers of the future. The North Wing of the CIS was completed this summer and construction of the East Wing is now underway. Completion of the full facility is expected in 2024.

Over the four-year grant period, 2020 to 2023, the Sherman Fairchild Foundation funding will allow Skidmore to purchase $494,240 worth of new scientific equipment — from a Raman microscope to an electron spin resonance spectrometer — to support inquiry-driven research and collaboration in Skidmore’s chemistry, environmental studies and sciences, health and human physiological sciences, biology, neuroscience and geosciences programs and beyond. The CIS will house all of Skidmore’s science departments and programs and foster interdisciplinary connections between and among the sciences, arts, humanities and social sciences.

“The grant brings to CIS cutting-edge equipment that will allow students to integrate and connect ideas from classrooms and laboratories across departments,” Juan Navea, associate professor of chemistry, said in the release. “It will provide them with hands-on experience on techniques to untangle challenges, be creative and find their way around our increasingly integrated world.”

Two new awards from the National Science Foundation — nearly $327,000 for the Skidmore Chemistry Department’s purchase of a nuclear magnetic resonance spectrometer and nearly $267,000 for the Neuroscience and Biology departments’ purchase of an analyzer that measures glycolysis and mitochondrial respiration — will also enhance research and instruction in the CIS.

In addition to coinciding with the phased completion of Skidmore’s new state-ofthe-art science facilities, the grants are timed with the rollout of the new General Education curriculum this fall and will help students and faculty fully realize their innovative and multidisciplinary educational goals.

More information about Skidmore College and its programs is available online at www.skidmore. edu.

PHOTO PROVIDED Jesse O’Connell, MDOCS program coordinator (second from left), Andrew J. Schneller, assistant professor of environmental studies and sciences (second from right), and Adam Tinkle, assistant professor and director of MDOCS (right), partnered with the Sheridan Hollow Alliance for Renewable Energy (SHARE) to host “Climates of Inequality: Stories of Environmental Justice” at the Albany Stage 1 Gallery in March. The international touring multimedia exhibition showcased Albany’s SHARE and 21 other communities working to expose the roots of environmental injustices.

ERIN COVEY PHOTO Juan Navea, associate professor of chemistry, collaborated with fellow Skidmore faculty members to secure approximately $500,000 for the college through the Sherman Fairchild Foundation’s Scientific Equipment Program.