ATE Grant Program Info

From

Notes

These are some excerpts that I have copied out of the previous ATE Program Solicitation

Centers

Regional Centers of Excellence: Regional Centers should focus on a particular field of technology and have a clear, measurable impact on the workforce and economy in a logically defined geographic region. Regional Centers are cooperative efforts between the region's employers and academic institutions and should be designed so that the relationships developed during the grant period are institutionalized. Although a Regional Center may have national impacts, the mission, structure, activities, and products of a Regional Center should be carefully designed to fit the region's particular characteristics and needs in the relevant field of technology. When possible, the Center's activities should be coordinated with local, regional, and statewide economic development strategic plans. Regional Centers are expected to focus mainly on reforming academic programs to produce a greater number of highly qualified workers who meet regional workforce demands and who also meet national industry and academic skill standards.

A Regional Center should normally undertake a wide range of activities associated with program improvement and professional development for educators, as described in Section II.A.1 ("ATE Projects") above. Normally, the development of new educational materials is not a mission of a Regional Center, but the collection, adaptation, and implementation of existing exemplary materials is a common activity. The center should lead systemic reform at all or most of the academic institutions in the region, engaging a large number of the region's college faculty and secondary school teachers in the relevant discipline(s). The center must have mechanisms for measuring the number and quality of students who are recruited, achieve competencies in relevant areas, receive industry certifications (when relevant), participate in internships, graduate, and find appropriate employment. The center must also have high visibility and support at the collaborating educational institutions. Center leaders should be prepared to contribute to longitudinal studies that examine students' performance in the workplace and measure employers' satisfaction with graduates.

Regional Centers are invited in any field of technology normally supported by the ATE program. However, all proposals must present a strong case for the regional economic significance of the chosen technological field.

Resource Centers: Resource Centers constitute a highly visible source of educational materials, ideas, contacts, and mentoring and have a national focus and a broad impact. Resource Centers may focus on a particular field of technological education or cut across several technology fields to promote best practices in areas such as recruitment, retention, curriculum development, teaching practices, and industry partnerships. Generally, only ATE national or regional centers and exemplary ATE projects that have already completed their original grants are well-positioned to become Resource Centers because leaders of these centers must demonstrate that they have already made substantial, high-quality contributions to technological education.

Resource Centers partner with business and industry, government agencies, professional societies; and academic institutions. They work on national initiatives to bring about systemic changes in the way students are prepared for our national technical workforce and to expand the role that community colleges play as agents of change towards this goal. Resource Centers typically undertake activities such as:

providing support and mentoring for institutions that wish to start or improve educational programs in a particular field of technology; establishing and supporting additional industry, business and academic partnerships; organizing and offering professional development opportunities for educators; promoting technician careers and visibility and the public image in the field(s) on which the Center is focused; addressing technician knowledge, skills, and competencies needed for the evolving, converging, and emerging technical workplace; and screening, validating, updating, and broadly distributing exemplary materials, curricula, and pedagogical practices adapted or designed by ATE centers and projects and other appropriate sources.