Chemistry receives $207,555 for grants

The U.S. Department of Education recently awarded the IU-Bloomington chemistry department with a $207,555 grant for low-income and minority graduate students. The endowment was announced Thursday by U.S. Sen. Evan Bayh.\nBayh said the grant will be essential to students with limited options, according to a statement. \n"This money means more opportunities for students in Indiana who otherwise might not have been able to afford a graduate degree," Bayh said. "This funding will help bridge the gap between the educational haves and have-nots and help train students in high-tech fields where additional workers are needed."\nThe grant was appropriated via the Graduate Assistance in Areas of National Need Program. According to a government Web site, the program was established to assist low-income students majoring in "areas of national need," including biology, chemistry, computer and information science, engineering, geological science, mathematics and physics.\nIU Director of Graduate Studies Jeff Zaleski said those departments are designated as areas of national need because of the importance and scarcity of the professions pursued by those students.\n"There are fewer students choosing to go into those areas of science," Zaleski said. "Obviously, our country needs hard scientists, and this grant helps us keep those students."\nZaleski said graduate students in the chemistry department receive a stipend each year of roughly $20,000, which must be accounted for by the University. \nThe GAANN grant will be used toward the stipends of five graduate students during a period of three years, Zaleski said, which means more than two-thirds of those students' stipends will be covered by the new funding. \nZaleski said he was optimistic the money would serve the GAANN Program's goals of enhanced diversity and talent within the IU chemistry department.\n"Naturally, it's going to increase our graduate enrollment, and it will increase our diversity," Zaleski said. "I also believe it will help us in the future recruit students from under-represented backgrounds and generate Ph.D's in an area of national need."\nJunior Ashish Thaker, a chemistry major, said the additional funding will be beneficial to diversity among chemistry students.\n"There's definitely a need for more qualified and intelligent students going into chemistry," Thaker said. "I think these grants will increase diversity within the chemistry department because the grants will offer minorities and students from financially-dependent families another option."\nZaleski said a small portion of the IU grant will be sent to faculty members from other undergraduate institutions in order to recruit graduate students for IU.\nThe U.S. Department of Education also allocated more than $166,000 in GAANN grants to Purdue University for engineering graduate students, according to a press release.\nThaker said he believes the grants will help IU's chemistry department compete with others around the U.S.\n"I think other universities have better funded, better developed chemistry programs," he said. "But I think this funding will allow IU to compete with the bigger departments."\n-- Contact staff writer Rick Newkirk at renewkir@indiana.edu.