Kenan-Biddle Partnership Offering $5,000 Grants to Bring Duke, UNC Students Together on Academic Projects

Duke University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill are accepting applications for the fourth year of the Kenan-Biddle Partnership, designed to promote collaborative projects involving students of the two universities. The initiative is funded by the William R. Kenan, Jr. Charitable Trust and The Mary Duke Biddle Foundation.

Last year, the partnership awarded 11 grants totaling $54,600 for projects ranging from a Cancer Pro Bono Legal project to Healthy Girls Engineering Change to NeuroCare. To read about the current and past grantees, visit studentaffairs.duke.edu/kenan-biddle.

The Kenan-Biddle Partnership grant promotes student-initiated, inter-institutional projects designed to strengthen established collaborations or encourage new ones. Proposed projects may also contribute to the scholarly or public service missions of both campuses, including collaborative arts, sciences and humanities projects that will positively affect both campus communities. Each proposal must have a student or students who serve as the project initiator, and must include at least one public exhibition, presentation or performance to bring the benefit of the grant to a broader community.

The Kenan-Biddle Partnership is the latest in a growing list of positive collaborative efforts between the institutions. The privately funded Robertson Scholars Program, for instance, was designed to be a catalyst for increased collaboration between students, faculty and staff of the two universities. Since its inception in 2000, the merit-based scholarship program has allowed hundreds of top students to study at both institutions and take part in leadership development opportunities. 

Other joint efforts include the Nannerl O. Keohane Distinguished Visiting Professorship, also co-funded by the William R. Kenan, Jr. Charitable Trust, and partnerships in a variety of academic and civic-minded programs locally and abroad.

Grant requests, which can be used flexibly for project support and/or materials, should be for about $5,000. However, other amounts may be considered depending upon the scope and impact of the project. The grants run for the 2014 calendar year. Preference will be given to proposals made jointly by students from both institutions. 

The proposals will be reviewed by an advisory committee of students, faculty and administrators co-chaired by Carol P. Tresolini, vice provost for academic initiatives at UNC, and Larry Moneta, vice president for student affairs at Duke.

Proposal applications may be submitted through Oct. 11. Decisions will be announced in November for a Jan. 1, 2014, start. 

Applicants should visit http://studentaffairs.duke.edu/kenan-biddle for more information and application instructions.  

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The William R. Kenan, Jr. Charitable Trust was created in 1965 from the estate of alumnus William R. Kenan, Jr., a member of UNC's class of 1894. The Kenan family's ties to UNC date to 1790 when James Kenan, a member of the University's first Board of Trustees, contributed $50 to the construction of Old East, the nation's first state university building.  The trust and related Kenan entities and family members collectively were the single largest donor to the university's last major fundraising drive, the Carolina First Campaign, committing nearly $70 million.

Named for the daughter of Duke University benefactor Benjamin N. Duke, The Mary Duke Biddle Foundation’s mission is to further and extend Mrs. Biddle's life-long interests in religious, educational and charitable activities in New York City and the state of North Carolina. Since its inception in 1956, The Mary Duke Biddle Foundation has awarded grants totaling approximately $36 million in support of the goals she endorsed and the values she exemplified.