The Council of Independent Colleges (CIC)
today announced that Lilly Endowment Inc. has awarded CIC a grant of $5,509,978
to support the intellectual and theological exploration of vocation at
independent colleges and universities. The grant will support further extension
of the Network for Vocation in Undergraduate Education (NetVUE) initiative as
well as additional offerings of CIC’s Presidential Vocation and Institutional
Mission program.
Established in 2009, NetVUE now includes 179 member colleges and
universities. Among them are institutions with both formal and historic ties to
a wide variety of Protestant, Catholic, and other religious bodies, as well as
institutions with wholly secular traditions. Lilly Endowment’s grant includes
$4.7 million for NetVUE and will provide a fourth round of Program Development
Grants with awards of up to $50,000 available to many NetVUE member
institutions. It also establishes a new program of Professional Development
Awards open to all NetVUE member institutions, offering up to $10,000 per
college or university to support the enrichment of vocational understanding and
practices among institutional leaders.
In announcing the grant, CIC President Richard Ekman said, “We are
delighted by the Lilly Endowment’s extraordinary continuing support of these two
CIC programs. This grant will help us advance the continuing emphasis on
vocation as a powerful pedagogy as colleges help undergraduates explore
questions of meaning and purpose in relation to choices of academic majors and
professional aspirations. Second, the grant will enable individuals who are
considering advancement to a college presidency to explore the vocational
dimensions that are central to the mission of most CIC colleges and
universities. And third, this grant will sustain NetVUE until 2020 by cushioning
a more gradual path to financial independence. NetVUE is an initiative that is
being built to last.”
Of the total grant, $800,000 will support three additional annual cycles of
the Presidential Vocation and Institutional Mission program. Building on
previous success, this program will be offered to senior campus leaders who are
considering future service as a college or university president. The goal is to
strengthen the pool of presidential candidates who understand their work as a
calling and are more fully prepared to invest in the distinctive missions of
independent colleges and universities.
CIC’s commitment to support “the intellectual and theological exploration
of vocation” began in 2005 with the establishment of the Presidential Vocation
and Institutional Mission program, followed by the exploratory Vocation in
Undergraduate Education Conference in March 2009. Subsequently a $2.4 million
grant from Lilly Endowment was received to develop NetVUE over six years and
renew the Vocation and Mission program. Initially, NetVUE programs and services
included national and regional conferences for faculty members and other campus
leaders, consultations, a campus visit program, and use of an online resource
library. In October 2011, the Endowment provided a second grant of $6.9 million
to expand NetVUE by providing funds for program development grants to NetVUE
institutions, the development of new scholarly resources about vocation, and an
initiative to strengthen the campus chaplaincy. The third grant, announced
today, deepens NetVUE’s capacity to develop institutional leadership based on
the idea of a called life.
NetVUE is directed by Shirley J. Roels, CIC senior advisor and professor of
management at Calvin College (MI). More information about NetVUE programs,
services, and membership is available at
www.cic.edu/NetVUE. The Presidential Vocation and Institution
Mission initiative is led by William V. Frame, CIC senior advisor and president
emeritus of Augsburg College (MN). More information about this initiative is
available at:
www.cic.edu/VocationMission.