Microsoft Corporation’s renewed partnership with the Thurgood Marshall College Fund (TMCF) has hit the $29 million mark, providing software for TMCF’s 47-member network of Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs).
This most recent partnership resulted in an $8 million software grant from the Redmond, WA-based company to help support TMCF-member schools. Over the past seven years, Microsoft has provided TMCF-member schools with $21 million in software. This new grant brings the total to date to $29 million. “Microsoft has always been committed to working with colleges and universities to help students achieve the knowledge and skills necessary to thrive in a competitive industry. These grants have been a major contributor to facilitate capacity building for our network of schools,” said TMCF President & CEO Johnny C. Taylor, Jr.
The new $8 million software grant will allow TMCF to continue its ongoing IT initiative to strengthen the IT capacity of its member schools, broaden the institutions’ instructional and communications capabilities, and work to build sustainable learning environments.
Dr. Ronald J. Langley, managing director of the Educational Consulting Foundation of Bakersfield, CA., and a long-standing member of Microsoft’s Technology Advisory Committee, viewed the ongoing Microsoft/TMCF partnership as “a continuation of a very successful program that has been beneficial to the TMCF schools, and will continue to provide the institutions with up-to-date software and enable them to enhance their instructional support and programs.”
Everette J. Freeman, president of Albany State University of Albany, GA, added that “we will make intelligent and effective use of the resources the grant will provide to continue to graduate the best and the brightest — for our students, faculty and staff.”
The Microsoft/TMCF partnership has been and continues to be part of TMCF’s long-term Technology Initiative.
“Access to technology, and the skills to use that technology opens up new opportunities for communities and people around the world,” according to Akhtar Badsha, senior director of global community affairs at Microsoft. “We’re proud of our longstanding partnership with TMCF and our shared commitment that all students today have access to the tools and skills required for tomorrow’s careers.”
Source:http://www.marketwatch.com/story/microsoft-donates-8m-software-grant-to-thurgood-marshall-college-fund-raising-partnership-gift-total-to-29m-2011-08-30
