This multi-faceted program has emerged over many years as contacts and joint projects between the two universities have expanded. There is great benefit for the University of Pretoria to have a strategic hub in eastern North America, and for NC State to have an equal point of contact in southern Africa.  Our universities are well-aligned for collaboration as discipline comprehensive, teaching-research-outreach extensive, and PhD/DVM level degree-granting institutions. 

Both institutions enjoy high rankings and can foster and facilitate academic collaborations of nearly every kind, which can serve as an efficient gateway into each others' geographic regions.  There is much yet to be done to breathe full life into this relationship!

This new inter-institutional seed grant program is designed to enhance research and programmatic collaborations.  This program is the outcome of a mutual challenge put forth in December 2009 for each university to match the other with a $20,000 (USD) contribution. It is our mutual determination that these funds will not only foster research collaborations between our institutions, but that they will truly lead, as our university missions and goals demand, to enhanced understanding and stewardship of the human and natural worlds we share across these distant continent.

For more information and to download the RFP, please visit the program website at: http://www.ncsu.edu/oia/UP_NCState_Connection.html

Proposals should be submitted to Ginger Davis ([email protected])  by
close of business on June 10, 2010. We look forward to receiving your submissions!