FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact: Cindy Deppe, media relations, 641-269-4834

December 18, 2007

A.V. DAVIS FOUNDATIONS AWARD GRINNELL COLLEGE $200,000 GRANT FOR BIOLOGY TEACHING LABS

Grinnell College has received a $200,000 grant from the Arthur Vining Davis Foundations to complete construction of introductory biology teaching labs in the newly renovated Robert N. Noyce Science Center.

Introductory biology courses at Grinnell are inquiry-based and taught in a workshop-style that allows students to move from lecture and discussion in the classroom to research in an adjacent lab. The classroom/lab suites made possible by the A.V. Davis Foundations grant allow flexibility for individual or group work as students begin self-directed research projects immediately in the first-year course.

"All of the Introduction to Biological Inquiry sections are question-driven," said Vince Eckhart, associate professor of biology and chair of the department. "Because of the inquiry-based nature of the intro courses, students learn through discovery something that we as scientists didn’t know before. We are grateful to the Arthur Vining Davis Foundations for supporting this workshop-style teaching facility."

The Noyce Science Center is named for the late Robert Noyce, a 1949 graduate, co-inventor of the integrated circuit, and co-founder of Intel Corp. Approximately one-third of Grinnell students graduate with a major in science and many continue into some of the top graduate programs in the country; in fact, Grinnell ranks high nationally in the matriculation of graduates who later complete Ph.D.s in chemistry (6th nationally), biological sciences (9th), psychologists (9th), and physicists (20th).

The Arthur Vining Davis Foundations award grants primarily in the areas of private higher education, secondary education, graduate theological education, health care and public television.

Grinnell College is a nationally recognized, private, four year, liberal arts college located in Grinnell, Iowa. Founded in 1846, Grinnell enrolls 1,600 students from all 50 states and from as many international countries in more than 25 major fields, interdisciplinary concentrations, and pre-professional programs.

-30-