This is historical material, "frozen in time." The web site is no longer updated and links to external web sites and some internal pages will not work.

THE WHITE HOUSE

Office of the Vice President

For Immediate Release August 26, 1999

         VICE PRESIDENT AL GORE ANNOUNCES $10 MILLION IN GRANTS
               TO EXPAND OPPORTUNITIES FOR ADULT LEARNERS

Washington, DC -- Americans struggling to balance work and family and still get the education they need to get ahead will find new educational opportunities more accessible thanks to $10 million in new federal grants to expand access to high quality education for adults, announced today by Vice President Al Gore.

The new funds will be provided by the U.S. Department of Education's "Learning Anytime Anywhere Partnerships," (LAAP). Under LAAP, colleges, universities, companies, and non-profit organizations join together to expand access to high-quality learning opportunities students can access "anytime, anywhere" for example through the Internet. This is particularly important for adults, who often find it difficult to participate in traditional classroom-based instruction because of the competing demands of work and family.

"All Americans deserve access to educational opportunities that will help them get ahead. We must make it possible for adults to learn at a time, pace, and location that works around the constraints of their daily lives," said Vice President Al Gore. "At a time when what you earn depends on what you learn, we need to promote innovative ways of educating Americans so that they can compete for the high-wage, high-skill jobs that our economy is creating in record numbers."

LAAP is especially designed to help students in underserved geographic areas, who have limited access to the traditional college campus setting, and who need more flexible education and training opportunities to keep pace with changes in the job market. Simultaneously, the program helps meet the current critical needs of business and industry.

The LAAP grants may be used to develop:

Model programs and software that will make distance learning possible;
Innovative on-line student support services such as job placement, academic counseling, and library services.
New institutional policies and practices that go beyond merely putting more courses online but truly deliver programs that are self-paced alternatives to traditional semester scheduling.
Methods of assessing the quality and success of these new distance learning programs by charting the skills and competencies achieved by students, as well as retention and completion rates.

LAAP grants are awarded to partnerships involving two or more institutions of higher education, community organizations, businesses, and other public and private agencies. Partnerships stimulate resource sharing, reduce program duplication, and promote economies of scale.

Examples of the grants include:

The National Telecommuting Institute will develop an at-home training program that will prepare people with severe disabilities to perform customer service jobs in "e-commerce" from their homes using the Internet.
The Hispanic Educational Telecommunications System (HETS) will create a virtual learning community composed of students, faculty, counselors and professionals. HETS will pool faculty and staff to develop workforce training and counseling as well as courses for academic credit. The project will serve an estimated 100,000 students enrolled through the nation's Hispanic Serving Institutions.
The College of the Mainland in Texas project will partner with some 30 Gulf Coast petrochemical companies to develop a program for industry workers to refresh their skills, learn new technologies and safety precautions, or earn an associate's degree.

LAAP grantees are required to provide 50 percent of the total project costs. The total federal funding for these grants is $35 million over the next five years. However the 29 grantees have generated $60 million to support their projects for a total public and private investment of roughly $95 million over a five-year period.

More information on the grants is available on the World Wide Web at http://www.ed.gov/offices/OPE/FIPSE/LAAP

###

               LEARNING ANYTIME ANYWHERE PARTNERSHIPS (LAAP)
                               FY1999 Awards

Lead: North Carolina State University -- $578,774 (total funding: 3 years, $978,287)
Contact: John S. Risley, 919-515-2524, risley@ncsu.edu Partners: Davidson County CC*(NC), Duke U. (NC), NC A&T State U., North Park U. (IL), Addison Wesley Longman, Brooks/Cole Publishing Co., John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Saunders College Publishing, Prentice Hall, W.H Freeman and Company Publishers

Lead: Educational Communications Foundation (VA)-- $346,934 (total funding: 4 years, $1,139,324)
Contact: Randal A. Lemke, 703-273-7200, x. 703, rlemke@iciahq.org Partners: Northern VA CC (VA), Dallas County (TX) CC District, Coastline CC (CA), Metropolitan CC (MO), Miami-Dade CC (FL), Monroe CC (NY), Portland CC (OR)

Lead: Hazardous Materials Training and Research Institute (HMTRI) (IA) -- $282,654 (total funding: 5 years, $1,146,191) Contact: Patricia Berntsen, 319-395-5893, pbernts@kirkwood.cc.ia.us Partners: Kirkwood CC (IA), Scott CC (IA), Aiken Tech. Coll. (SC), Amarillo CC (TX), Blue Ridge C C (NC), Crownpoint Institute of Technology (NM), Cuyahoga CC (OH), Cypress Mandela/WIST Training Center (CA), Davis Applied Technology Center (NM), Dona Ana Branch CC (NM), Highline CC (WA), Lakeshore Tech. Coll. (WI), Miami-Dade CC - North, New England Interstate Environmental Training Center (ME), Owens CC (OH), Strive - Boston Employment Service Inc., Ulster CC (NY), U. of FL

Lead: Indiana U. (IN) -- $332,811 (total funding: 5 years, $1,570,325) Contact: Thomas Duffy, 812-856-8459, duffy@indiana.edu Partners: U. of CO - Denver (CO), Western Governors U. (CO), Phi Delta Kappa International (IN), EDUCAUSE/IMS (CA)

Lead: University of Detroit Mercy -- $360,072 (total funding: 5 years, $1,302,127)
Contact: Cynthia Zane, 313-963-6388, zanecy@udmercy.edu Partners: Detroit Public Health Department, Mercy Health Services (MI), Oakland U. (MI), St. John Health System (MI), U. of MI, Wayne State U. (MI), Detroit Medical Center

Lead: Fox Valley Technical College (WI) -- $307,598 (total funding: 3 years, $800,520)
Contact: Kay Chitwood and Carol May, 920-735-5682, chitwood@foxvalley.tec.wi.us
Partners: WI Tech. Coll. System Board, Blackhawk Tech. Coll. (WI), Chippewa Valley Tech. Coll. (WI), Gateway Tech. Coll. (WI), Lakeshore Tech. Coll. (WI), Madison Area Tech. Coll. (WI), Mid-State Tech. Coll. (WI), Milwaukee Area Tech. Coll. (WI), Moraine Park Tech. Coll. (WI), Nicolet Area Tech. Coll. (WI), Northcentral Tech. Coll. (WI), Northeast WI Tech. Coll., Southwest WI Tech. Coll., Western WI Tech. Coll., WI Indianhead Tech. Coll.

Lead: National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators (NASFAA) (DC) -- $281,701 total funding: 3 years, $930,870) Contact: Ellen Blackmun, 202-785-0453 x. 161, blackmun@nasfaa.org Partners: TX Guarantee Student Loan Corporation (TGSL), U. of NC at Wilmington

Lead: University of Colorado at Denver -- $156,685 (total funding: 4 years, $405,734)
Contact: Doris R. Kimbrough, 303-556-3202, dkimbrough@castle.cudenver.edu
Partners: U. of NC at Wilmington (NC), CO Electronic CC (CO), Brunswick CC (NC), Cape Fear CC (NC), Addison Wesley Longman, Inc., and Eduprise.com

Lead: The Hispanic Educational Telecommunications System (HETS) (PR) -- $376,275 (total funding: 5 years, $1,997,071) Contact: Nitza Hernandez Lopez, U. of Puerto Rico, 787-250-0000, x. 2052, n_hernandez@upr1.upr.clu.edu
Partners: U. of Puerto Rico, U. of TX-Pan American, U. of the Sacred Heart (PR), Herbert H. Lehman College - City U. of NY, Electronic Data Systems (EDS) Corporation

Lead: National Telecommuting Institute, Inc. (MA) -- $351,925 (total funding: 3 years, $1,962,255)
Contact: M. J. Willard, 617-787-4426 x. 305, mjwillard@nti.org Partners: NY State Department of Vocational and Educational Services for Individuals with Disabilities, Willow CyberCenter Network (a consortium of public and private sector organizations that includes Bell South, MCI/Worldcom, Nortel Networks, Automatic Data Processing, and Willow CSN), MA Institute of Technology (MIT) Center for Advanced Educational Services

Lead: Pennsylvania State University -- $317,171 (total funding: 3 years, $982,059)
Contact: Robert Snyder, 814-865-0912, rns3@psu.edu Partners: Apple Computer, Inc., Sun Microsystems, Report Mill Software

Lead: Pace University (NY) -- $329,400 (total funding: 3 years, $997,017)
Contact: David Sachs, 914-673-8820, dsachs@pace.edu Partners: Council for Adult and Experiential Learning (CAEL) (CO) and the National Advisory Council on Telecommunications Education and Learning (NACTEL), which includes Bell Atlantic Network Services, the Communication Workers of America (CWA), GTE, the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW), SBC, and US West

Lead: Washington State Board for Community and Technical Colleges (SBCTC) -- $374,636 (total funding: 4 years, $1,841,285) Contact: Jan Yoshiwara, 360-753-4691, jyoshiwara@sbctc.ctc.edu Partners: Washington Association for Community and Tech. Coll.s, Washington OnLine Consortium, Campus Consortium, TLT Flashlight, Center for Information Services

Lead: Arizaona State University -- $497,331 (total funding: 4 years, $1,953,152)
Contact: Gary Bitter, 480-965-4960, bitter@asu.edu Partners: Cisco Systems, Inc. (CA), Pearson Education, Inc. (MA)

Lead: East Carolina University (NC) -- $270,499 (total funding: 3 years, $924,437)
Contact: David Hillis, 252-328-4147/6705, hillisd@mail.ecu.edu Partner: Ericsson Wireless Internet Solutions

Lead: The Western Interstate Commission for Higher Education (WICHE), Western Cooperative for Educational Telecommunications (CO) -- $241,300 (total funding: 3 years, $734,652)
Contact: Barbara Krauth, WICHE, 303-541-0308, bkrauth@wiche.edu Partners: Systems and Computer Technology Corporation (SCT), Kapi'olani CC (HI), Regis U. (CO), KS State U.

Lead: PBS Literacy Link (VA) -- $448,489 (total funding: 5 years, $2,410,717)
Contact: Noreen S. Lopez, , 703-739-8692, nlopez@pbs.org Partners: U. of PA/National Center on Adult Literacy, Jefferson County (KY) Public Schools Adult Education, KY State U., KY Manufacturing Company, KLRN Public TV (TX)

Lead: University of North Carolina at Greensboro -- $405,375 (total funding: 5 years, $1,808,619)
Contact: Gerald W. Meisner, 336-334-5330, jm@curieuncg.edu Partners: NC A & T State U. Davidson College (NC), NC Department of Public Instruction, and webslingerZ, Inc.

Lead: North Dakota Association of Tribal Colleges (NDATC) -- $290,288 (total funding: 3 years, $779,600)
Contact: Phyllis Howard, 701-255-3285 x. 396, phoward58@hotmail.com Partners: Candeska Cikana CC (ND), Fort Berthold CC (ND), Sisseton-Wahpeton CC (SD), Sitting Bull College (ND), Turtle Mountain CC (ND), United Tribes Tech. Coll. (ND), Western Cooperative for Educational Telecommunications (CO), Legacy Solutions, Archipelago Productions

Lead: University of of Arizona -- $473,470 (total funding: 3 years, $1,480,950)
Contact: Frances Himes, 520-621-5177, himes@u.AZ.edu Partners: Pima CC (AZ), Oracle Corporation, Silicon Graphics, Inc., Sun Inc.

Lead: College of the Mainland (TX) -- $229,081 (total funding: 3 years, $921,122)
Contact: Joanna Kile, 409-938-1211 x. 502, jkile@mail.mainland.cc.tx.us Partner: Gulf Coast Process Technology Alliance (a consortium of 30 Gulf Coast petrochemical companies, 20 community colleges and universities in TX, LA, and MI, plus professional organizations, government agencies and training companies)

Lead: Stephen F. Austin State University (TX) -- $306,936 (total funding: 5 years, $1,653,418)
Contact: Anna L. Bradfield, 409-468-2906, abradfield@sfasu.edu Partners: TX Tech U. TX School for the Blind/Visually Impaired, TX Education Agency, TX Higher Education Coordinating Board, State Board for Education Certification

Lead: Rocky Mountain College (MT) -- $145,788 (total funding: 3.5 years, $500,960)
Contact: Arthur H. DeRosier, Jr., 406-657-1015, derosiea@rocky.edu Partners: Fort Peck CC (MT), Little Big Horn College (MT), Salish Kotenai College (MT)

Lead: University of Washington -- $708,857 (total funding: 3 years, $1,383,385)
Contact: David Szatmary, 206-685-6313, dszatmary@ese.washington.edu Partners: Prentice Hall, World Organization of Webmasters (CA), Public Broadcasting Service (VA)

Lead: The University of Texas Medical Branch -- $387,397 (total funding: 3 years, $1,119,968)
Contact: Vicki Freeman, 409-722-3056, vfreeman@utmb.edu Partners: U. of TX Pan American, U. of NE Medical Center, U. of KY, Wharton County Junior College (TX), U. of TX Brownsville/TX Southmost College, Seminole State College (TX), U. of Houston-Clear Lake, National Laboratory Training Network (GA), Southern Regional Education Board (GA)

Lead: Indiana State University -- $252,802 (total funding: 3 years, $1,152,788)
Contact: Nancy Franklin, 812-237-8452, extfrank@ruby.instate.edu Partners: Vincennes U. (IN), Ivy Tech State College-Terre Haute, Ivy Tech State College-Columbus, Ivy Tech State College-South Bend

Lead: Southern Regional Education Board (SREB) (GA) -- $210,249 (total funding: 3 years, $785,277)
Contact: Bruce Chaloux, 404-875-9211, bruce.chaloux@sreb.org Partners: Eighteen additional partners, including FL Gulf Coast U., the U. of NC, the FL Community College Distance Learning Consortium, and the Higher Education Boards, Departments, or Commissions of AL, AR, DE, FL, GA, KY, LA, MD, MS, OK, SC, TN, TX, VA and WV.

Lead: Oregon University System -- $513,432 (total funding: 3 years, $1,405,836)
Contact: Holly Zanville, 541-346-5764, zanvillh@ous.edu Partners: eCollege.com, Eastern OR U., OR Health Science U., OR Institute of Technology, OR State U., Portland State U., Southern OR U., U. of OR, Western OR U.

Lead: Utah State University --The Center for Persons with Disabilities -- $174,398 (total funding: 4 years, $861,360) Contact: Cyndi Rowland, 435-797-3381, cyndi@cpd2.edu Partners: Public Broadcasting System (PBS) Adult Learning Service (VA), The American Association for Higher Education, The Teaching, Learning and Technology (TLT) Affiliate of AAHE (DC), Western Governors U. (CO), MadDuck Technologies (VA)

# # #