Based at Florence-Darlington Technical College, SC
Mentor-Connect offers one-on-one mentoring, curated technical resources, and instruction to help two-year college faculty prepare competitive proposals to the NSF ATE program. Mentor-Connect projects are implemented in partnership with the American Association of Community Colleges (AACC). Mentor-Connect is located in the Southeastern Institute of Manufacturing Technology (SiMT) facility at Florence-Darlington Technical College.
Mentor-Connect provides mentoring for two-year technical and community colleges that are new or relatively new to the ATE Program. The most extensive mentoring and technical assistance is provided to two-year colleges classified as new to ATE. This funding track is designed to make NSF ATE funding more inviting and accessible to two-year colleges that lack experience with NSF grant proposal development guidelines and submission processes.
Each year, cohorts of new-to-ATE colleges are provided with extensive assistance, enabling them to develop and submit competitive ATE grant proposals. In addition, Mentor-Connect provides customized mentoring and technical assistance to potential grantees who are either seeking a second ATE project grant, or whose first or second NSF ATE Program proposal submission was declined (not funded). These additional services are called “Moving Up” and “Second Chance” mentoring.
