LITTLE PRIEST TRIBAL COLLEGE AWARDED A NATIONAL SCIENCE FOUNDATION GRANT TO IMPROVE CYBERSECURITY AND CREATE STEM OPPORTUNITIES FOR INDIGENOUS STUDENTS

May 8, 2023, Winnebago, Nebraska Little Priest Tribal College (LPTC) received a National Science Foundation (NSF) Equity for Excellence (EES) for science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) grant that will help the college meet compliance standards and ensure it is prepared to provide enhanced educational opportunities for its students. Grant funding came from within the Tribal Colleges and Universities Program (TCUP), and its goal to support, “instructional and research capacities of specific institutions of higher education that serve the Nation's Indigenous students.”

Manoj Patil, LPTC President says that this is a major win for the college and the funding is a much-needed step toward resourcing tribal colleges and universities (TCUs). “Little Priest Tribal College offers the same quality education that you’ll find at major universities, but TCUs do not have access to many of the same higher funding resources,” says Patil. “We are grateful to NSF for recognizing the need to invest in TCUs because these are the types of opportunities that can help us continue to support our own STEM experts within Indian Country.”

The NSF funding is also helping LPTC achieve benchmarks in ways that increase the safety and wellbeing of its students, families, and stakeholders. “We live in a world where we rely heavily on secure, reliable technology but creating these systems comes at a high cost,” says Morri Conway, LPTC Director of Information Technology. “Practically speaking, the grant funding will help the college get closer to its strategic goals of staffing, protecting the institutional network and data, providing a safe learning environment for students, and meeting federal and state compliance measures.”

Little Priest Tribal College will move forward with its planned cybersecurity infrastructure project and expects to be complete by May 31, 2024. To learn more about the Little Priest Tribal College, please visit, https://www.littlepriest.edu/about-lptc/.