The computer science department at the university is no longer being funded by the National Science Foundation grant, which has been offered for the past seven years.
In an interview, Dr. Florence Appel, Computer Science professor, further explained the department’s loss of the grant.
“We had two successful grant proposals over the last seven years,” stated Appel.
“The first one was for three years, and the second was for four. We reapplied last summer, but due to the large volume of applicants, we were declined.”
The National Science Foundation grant awards up to $6,000 a year, divided into semesters. Those incoming students wishing to qualify must have declared a major in computed and have earned a score of 23 on the ACT. Renewing students are required to maintain a 3.0 GPA.
With nearly 100 students in the Computer Science Department at Saint Xavier, the departments funds about 22-25 students a year.
“I’m sorely disappointed, because all the feedback that we have ever received from the National Science Foundation has been positive,” stated Appel.
“It’s very disappointing because I knew how much our students need this support, both financially and otherwise.”
Without the National Science Foundation grant, the department will not be able to fund the conferences available to computer science majors in prior years.
“We were able to fund [the students’] efforts to do things beyond what’s normal because we had the grant. Now that we don’t have the grant, we’re working with the administration to try and figure out how we can fund them,” Appel said.
However, the department has not loss hope. Rather, it is working to decrease the financial burdens that the discontinued grant may cause for computing students.
“We’re doing a lot,” Appel explained.
“We’re working with our students to enhance their ability to find internships. We have a partnership with the Smith Senior Living, and we will be operating a semester long internships for 8-10 students a semester.
We also have other internship opportunities that we’re working on for our students. We meet weekly in a seminar for the scholarship program, which is still ongoing to the end of the school year, and we’re also in the process of negotiating with some of the university administration to keep some of the scholarships available for students, even though we don’t have outside aid.”
According to Appel, the department is also looking to implement workshop for current and prospective students, as well as their parents, to talk about how to fund their education.
“It’s a difficult discipline, and sometimes it takes extra efforts to supports students, but we’ll continue to support them, because we love them,” Appel expressed.
“We’ll reapply as soon as we can, and try and get it going again. We’re down, but we’re not out.”
Nicole Rosales
Senior News Editor