GCCC Awarded $1 Million in Federal Funding for Technology Upgrades

Garden City Community College has been awarded $1,000,000 of federal funding to be used for technology upgrades, thanks to Senator Moran.

The final fiscal year (FY) 2022 appropriations package passed by Congress and was signed into law by President Joe Biden on March 22, 2022. In this, more than $95 million will be given by the federal government to 89 community colleges across the country. The funded initiatives include technology upgrades, improved student services, new academic programs and dozens of other projects. In total, 98 projects will be funded by the Departments of Education, Labor, and Health and Human Services.

The House and Senate revived its previous process of directing funding from federal agencies to specific projects in lawmakers’ home states and districts for the FY 2022 appropriations bill. Formerly known as “earmarking,” the practice was eliminated in Congress for a decade until Democratic leadership announced last spring that they would accept proposals from members for “community project funding” in the House and “congressionally-directed spending” in the Senate.

For FY 2022, individual members of Congress solicited requests for funding from constituents, which were then submitted to the House and Senate Appropriations Committees for review and inclusion in the final funding bill. GCCC representatives were in contact with Senator Moran regarding funding requests to enhance technology capabilities at GCCC.

The $1 million will go towards funding IT equipment upgrades, staff and technology to put Zoom enabled classrooms into each of the service area high schools in the GCCC service area, while also addressing technology upgrades for GCCC to enhance distance education.

“Since the pandemic, the importance and value of online education has been greatly realized”, Dr. Ruda, GCCC President, said. “GCCC is excited for this federal funding to help us provide additional online and hybrid courses to all of our service area high schools. In addition, this funding will allow us to enhance our distance education offerings through upgraded technology,” Dr. Ruda continued.

GCCC thanks Senator Moran for his support and effort in securing funds to assist in these much-needed technology upgrades.

Garden City Community College will receive this funding later in the year and planning has already begun for the listed projects.

_{Source:  https://www.gcccks.edu/events/gccc_awarded_1_million_in_federal_funding_for_technology_upgrades.aspx}