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Jefferson Trust Grants Set New Records

The Jefferson Trust Board of Trustees has had a banner year, awarding almost $1.4 million to 14 new projects and programs.

“The decision-making process was extremely difficult,” shares Amy Bonner, Director of Grants for the Trust. “This grant cycle was record-breaking in terms of dollars sought and exceptional ideas. With this cohort, we have taken another great step forward towards our vision of seeing every great idea at UVA come to fruition.”

The Trust awarded its largest-ever single grant to the School of Data Science. Researchers will study the practices surrounding “collaboratories,” or interdisciplinary research, making UVA a national leader in the field and bringing broad resources to the University.

Sustainability was a key theme this year, with Printers 4 Kids and the Co-designing Circular Plastics Initiative focusing on how UVA can improve plastics recycling. UVA Sawmilling, the UVA Exhibit at Columbus 2023, and the Building Community at Biscuit Run Park all focus on sustainable materials in action. Other grant themes included community engagement, student experience, and cutting-edge research.

The 2022-23 Grants:

Printers 4 Kids: $30,000

This project is creating STEM kits for local Charlottesville schools from discarded electronic equipment and working to establish UVA’s first plastic recycling center.

Building Community with Architecture and Design at Biscuit Run Park: $200,000

The School of Architecture, in partnership with Albemarle County Parks & Recreation, will provide students with experiences in the design, fabrication, and construction of several innovative installations and multi-functional spaces.

C-Ville Tulips: $150,000

Led by the Center for American English Language (CAELC) and the Sound Justice Lab, this program will bring student volunteers together with local refugee women to support them in English instruction and digital literacy, as well as provide youth programming opportunities.

Evaluating Collaboratory Cultures: $298,693

The School of Data Science will research collaboration and promote the findings to illustrate how more collaborative groups and cultures can be built across Grounds and throughout academia.

Virginia Baja Racing: $25,000

Funding helps to reestablish the Virginia Baja Racing Team through the purchase of materials, parts, and equipment, enabling the team to compete in the Baja SAE event in May 2023.

OrChiD-Bio: Organs-on-a-chip with integrated detection of bioluminescence: $100,000

This research project aims to create a novel instrument that will detect bioluminescence in living cells embedded within organ-on-a-chip devices.

Piloting an Open-source Educational Manufacturing Model: $49,900

Funding radically expands a STEM kit program from proof-of-concept stages at Buford Middle School in Charlottesville to a national, open-source curriculum.

UVA Sawmilling: Fully Sustainable: $137,860

Funding helps UVA Sawmilling in purchasing equipment, enhancing programming, and supporting personnel to make the program a self-sustaining organization and expand its outreach.

[De]Construction Project: remapping the roles of design and implementation in the building industry: $136,550

Through a series of workshops that reimagine the construction industry, students will rethink the collaboration between the labor force, design process, and implementation.

Co-designing Circular Plastics Initiative: $25,952

In collaboration with UVA’s recycling division, this project will repurpose recyclable plastics and film plastics into outdoor and indoor furniture.

UVA at Exhibit Columbus 2023: $35,000

Students will create a unique, sustainable architectural installation for Exhibit Columbus 2023 that will ultimately be displayed on Grounds for the UVA community.

1st UVA Construction Engineering and Management (CEM) Competition: $22,729

Funding will bring undergraduate and graduate students, faculty, and construction practitioners of the UVA Construction Industry Consortium and UVA Facilities Management together to build community and share ideas through competitive events.

Including Preschoolers with Autism: $61,841

Funding will develop and pilot a 12-week professional development program for preschool teachers of children with autism spectrum disorder.

The Sports Science and Analytics Collective: $123,314

The collective blends research and practical application in sports, healthy living, and musculoskeletal health to accelerate efforts in research, collaboration, and student education.

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Flash Funding Continues

We received 19 proposals requesting $170,297 in funding in the January Flash Funding cycle. Thank you, UVA for your innovative ideas and commitment to further enhance the University!

If you missed January, our February Flash funding proposal form is open. Flash grants are capped at $10,000 and focus on short-term projects or immediate use opportunities, often for student organizations. Proposals must be submitted no later than February 28, with decisions announced on March 15.

For additional information, please visit our Grant Seekers page or contact Amy Bonner at abonner@virginia.edu to discuss your idea and potential funding.

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Grants in the News!

Hosting symposiums, conducting workshops, and planning special events—our grantees are busy! Check out projects recently featured in local news:

Coming to the stage in 2023, The Daily Progress previewed Victory Hall’s Opera, Orpheus & Erica: A Deaf Opera, a 2022 grant recipient.

The Albert and Shirley Small Special Collections Library current exhibition from the Holsinger Portrait Project, “Visions of Progress: Portraits of Dignity, Style, and Racial Uplift” was featured in a two-part series on CBS19. Find out more about the exhibition and the descendants.

UVA Lawyer magazine highlighted the Roadmap Scholars Initiative and its first cohort of students. Read more about the impactful program in this article.

The Batten Institute at UVA’s Darden School of Business hosted the Jefferson Innovation Summit, “Decarbonizing the Global Economy.” Learn about the obstacles, strategies, and dialogue discussed in this Darden news article.

2022 Jefferson Innovation Summit: Decarbonizing the Global Economy (photo credit: Darden’s Batten Institute)

To stay up to date on the work of our grantees, follow us on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter.

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Cavalier Autonomous Racing continues to push

The Cavalier Autonomous Racing Team recently competed in the Indy Autonomous Challenge (IAC), at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, as a part of the Consumer Electronics Show (CES). CES is known as a global stage for innovation, and nine teams from six countries and representing 17 universities competed.

Cavalier Autonomous Racing (photo credit: UVA Engineering)

Joining the Indy Autonomous Challenge in 2019, the Cavalier Autonomous Racing team has participated in every IAC race held to date. With support from the Trust, the team is helping to push the boundaries of autonomous racing and creating safe autonomy. UVA’s team is comprised of undergraduate and graduate students in the School of Engineering, and the Indy Autonomous Challenge grants them access and opportunity on a world stage.

The modern CES began in 1998, though it has roots back to 1967 and was largely an event to see the latest video game or telephone. Today, CES has grown to be the launch point for some of the greatest electronic advancements across any industry, including automobiles.  It has replaced the North American Auto Show in Detroit as the go-to place for automakers to unveil new technology.

The Trust could not be happier to help provide this opportunity to UVA students, who are standing at the forefront of the automotive future.

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Grant Requests Aim High

Thank you to all 2022-2023 grant seekers!UVA grant seekers, thank you! The Trust received 96 Letters of Inquiry (LOI) requesting over $12 million in our annual grant cycle. Sixty-eight of these requests, valued at over $8.7 million, have moved forward to the full proposal stage.

Submissions cover wide variety of topics, including research and interventions around barriers to equity; community engagement efforts and pipeline programs; mental health post-Covid; sustainability; and interdisciplinary collaborations.

Our Proposals Committee has started reviewing the proposals in advance of the final round, which is an in-person pitch. The Trustees will look to grant $1.45 million this year across all funding cycles.

If you missed the annual cycle deadline, Flash Funding applications will open December 15 for the January 2023 flash cycle. Flash Funding grants are capped at $10,000 and focus on short-term projects or immediate use opportunities, often for student organizations. Flash Funding runs in the spring semester, and grants are made on a month-to-month basis as long as funds are available. Visit our Grant Seekers page for more information.

As always, we are available to answer any funding questions or meet to discuss your potential project. Contact our Director of Grants, Amy Bonner, for more information.

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Rotunda Planetarium Public Nights

Constellations projected onto the inside of the Rotunda dome

In the summer of 1818, Thomas Jefferson envisioned a painted planetarium, spanning the Rotunda’s dome. “It is proposed to be painted sky-blue and spangled with gilt stars in their position and magnitude copied exactly,” he wrote.

Fast-forward to 2019, and three UVA doctoral students worked to bring Jefferson’s vision to life. They received a Trust grant to purchase the equipment to “open the ceiling to the stars” and host an exhibition on the Rotunda Library’s early years.

Now, we are thrilled to share that Rotunda Planetarium public nights are re-launching! View the constellations and stars in the Rotunda Dome Room Friday, November 25, or Saturday, November 26, from 5:30 to 8:30 p.m. For more information, visit the Rotunda website.

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Looking Ahead

Students and faculty working on the Cavalair Project, which aims to conduct research to allow smarter approaches to HVAC system usage

President Dwight Eisenhower once remarked that “plans are worthless, but planning is everything.” While that may be a little heavy-handed, planning is indeed a valuable process. It is a chance to share ideas, discuss, debate, and decide.

The Jefferson Trust recently completed a strategic plan and, even more than any new operation or activity, is setting a new long-term goal. Trustees set an ambitious target of doubling the endowment to $100 million, which will provide $4 million in annual grant funding and the opportunity to make a single grant of $1 million.

“This is an ambitious goal for the Jefferson Trust and one that lives up to a principle of the strategic plan — to maximize the Trust’s value,” says Governance Committee Chair Nick Melton. “We see enormous potential for donors to build a legacy in the Trust and for the Trust to amplify these gift and time commitments to have a lasting impact on and beyond Grounds.”

The goal is also an acknowledgement that we have heard the University community’s call for more support, and we are making this promise to provide it.

When the Trust was formed in 2006, its founders dreamed of a day when the Trust could award $1 million in a single year. Having eclipsed that mark in 2020, this new grantmaking level will make a larger impact across Grounds and see more great ideas come to fruition.

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Grants in the News

Ashley Hosbach with some of the pandemic-related children’s books she’s collected in the most comprehensive collection of its kind in the country. Photo by Erin Edgerton

Our grantees have been busy this fall! Their hard work and efforts have drawn attention from UVA and Charlottesville news outlets. Check out the articles below:

Peer Financial Counseling was established to offer students free, one-on-one advice from a trained peer counselor on everything about money, including student loans, personal credit, budgeting. Read more about the program, a 2018 grant recipient, in this UVA Today article.

COVID-19 Pandemic Education and Support: Children’s Book Collection received a flash grant in 2021 to build a catalog of children’s books addressing loss, trauma, and anxiety due to the pandemic. Learn more about their work in this UVA Today feature.

The Holsinger Studio Portrait Project exhibit launched in September and is on display in the Main Gallery of the Albert and Shirley Small Special Collections Library until June 2023. The project has been featured in multiple publications since its release: The Daily Progress, UVA Library,  NBC29,  UVA Today,  C-ville Weekly, and Cavalier Daily. Community engagement opportunities and events are being planned.

High-school students explored public policy and leadership through the Policy Leadership Advocacy by Youth (PLAY) Program’s week-long summer workshop. Read more about the student’s and their experiences in this Batten School article.

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Annual Grant Cycle Open for 2022-23!

The Jefferson Trust Annual Cycle is open for the 2022-23 academic year!

Annual Cycle proposals come from students, faculty and staff for a variety of new programs and projects. They are typically intended for requests with budgets ranging from $10,000 to over $300,000, but there are no minimums. Maximums vary based on available funds.

Every Annual Cycle grant starts with a letter of inquiry (LOI), which is an opportunity to simply explain the idea; requests are reviewed on a rolling basis. Early LOI entries (before September 15) have the opportunity for edits and resubmission based on the Director of Grants’ feedback. From there, selected LOIs move to the proposal stage. After further review, a final batch moves forward for in-person pitches to the full Board of Trustees. Review the Annual Cycle timeline below for more information:

  • August 2022: LOI forms are available in the grant portal and can be submitted now!
  • September 15, 2022: Last day to submit an LOI with feedback
  • October 1, 2022: Last day to submit a finalized LOI
  • October 31, 2022: Proposal deadline
  • January 20-21, 2023: Proposal pitches
  • Early February 2023: Grants awarded!

We encourage you to plan ahead, learn more on our Grant Seekers page, and contact our Director of Grants, Amy Bonner, to talk through your innovative idea.

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Grants in News

Starr Hill Pathways scholars listen to University professors and students. Photo: Erin Edgerton

Many grant projects have been busy over the summer! From conducting field tests to hosting seminars, to preparing for future events, check out some incredible Jefferson Trust projects highlighted in the news:

An initiative from the UVA Equity Center and a 2022 annual grant recipient, Starr Hill Pathways brought middle-school students to Grounds for a three-week program to learn about the college experience and engage with a university. Check out their experiences in this UVA Today article, CBS19 feature, and Daily Progress article.

A 2022 flash grant recipient, “Chaos to Chaos: Documenting Afghan Women,” was recently highlighted on CBS19 News for their work to build community and share the stories of Afghan women in the local community.

The Roadmap Scholars Initiative hosted their first summer program, helping first-gen, low-income undergraduates prepare for and apply to elite law schools. Learn more about the scholars in this UVA Law article.

The UVA Solar Car team raced a custom solar-powered electric vehicle at the Formula Sun Grand Prix in Topeka, Kansas this summer. Learn about their preparations and building their car since receiving a Trust grant in 2017 in this Cav Daily article.

Since their 2018 grant, read about the growth and impact of Hoos Connected in this UVA Today feature. The grant funds a one-credit class lasting a single semester that teaches healthy relationship-building skills in small groups of first-year, second-year and transfer students.

“Madayin: Eight Decades of Aboriginal Australian Bark Painting from Yirrkala” is the first major exhibition of Aboriginal Australian bark paintings to tour the U.S. It opens in September 2022 at the Hood Museum. Kluge-Ruhe received a Trust grant in 2019 to help produce the accompanying catalog, a 352-page piece in both Yolngu Matha and English (which is the first ever international touring exhibition catalog in an Australian language). Read more about the significance of this exhibition.

The “Transformative Autism Biomarker Research Initiative” in UVA’s Developmental Neuroanalytics Lab was spotlighted in National Geographic’s June 2022 issue. A 2020 grant recipient, the lab is developing new universal screening protocols for social processing disorders.