2022 Making a Difference in Global Communities Grants Announced

Penn Arts & Sciences has awarded three Making a Difference (MAD) in Global Communities grants to faculty-led projects that will support multidisciplinary projects working with students to address societal challenges internationally. The initiative hopes to encourage proposals that address inequities in race, gender, sexual identity, socioeconomic mobility, education, health care, and political representation, as well as the grand challenges of climate change, poverty, and immigration.

The three projects are:

LAVA: Laboratorio para apreciar la vida y el ambiente is led by Michael Weisberg, Professor and Chair of Philosophy, and includes Erol Akcay, Associate Professor of Biology, as a co-faculty director, as well as Penn researchers from other schools. The program will engage Galapagueños in conservation research and practice about their environmental priorities, such as water quality, ocean health, sea lion/human interactions, and agriculture.

Using Animated Video to Address Sea Level Rise is led by Simon Richter, Class of 1942 Endowed Term Professor of French and Francophone, Italian, and Germanic Studies. Also affiliated with the project are Michael Weisberg, Professor and Chair of Philosophy, and Howard Neukrug, Professor of Practice. The goal of the project is to produce a series of animated videos that will inform both the water sector and the public at large about the impact of accelerated sea level rise on the Netherlands, and to contribute to public debate about how best to adapt.

Regional Collaboration for Better Crime Policy is led by Anthony Braga, Jerry Lee Professor of Criminology and the Director of the Crime and Justice Policy Lab. The project matches undergraduate and graduate students with community partners in Latin America and the Caribbean and engages them in a range of research activities to support innovation of new policy solutions.