A $10 million grant has been awarded to North Central College’s partnership.
More About North Central College’s Partnership
Valparaiso University, the University of Evansville (UE), and Drake University have collaborated with the Naperville college to create an independent, non-profit organization called the CUSP.
“It stands for College and University Sustainability Project that will reinvent the way we manage back office operations and business services for colleges and universities,” said Troy D. Hammond, President, North Central College.
Thanks to an initiative called “Charting the Future” from the Lilly Endowment Inc., which is designed to help Indiana colleges and universities, Valparaiso and UE are each receiving $5 million grants to help support this collaborative partnership.
CUSP
CUSP will take several years to implement, but once complete it will be a “shared, cloud-based enterprise resource planning (ERP) system with a single set of standardized business practices”.
“This is really innovative because this has a chance to make colleges and universities more efficient and productive,” said Hammond. “We’re continuing to strive to be affordable for our students, and this is a transformational way to do that.”
The Lilly Endowment Inc.
Based out of Indianapolis, Indiana, the Lilly Endowment INC. has made grants totaling more than $138 million. Their “Charting the Future” initiative has provided nearly $70 million to Indiana’s colleges and universities.
“Indiana’s colleges and universities face myriad challenges as they work to fulfill their educational missions while adapting to growing financial pressures, rapid demographic and technological changes, and evolving needs and demands of students,” said Ted Maple, the Endowment’s vice president for education. “We are pleased with the creative and collaborative approaches the colleges and universities are taking to address these challenges and seize opportunities to better serve their students, institutions, communities and the state of Indiana through these nine projects.”
To learn more about CUSP you can visit North Central College’s website.
Naperville News 17’s Christian Canizal reports.
If you have a story idea or news tip you want to share, we want to hear from you!