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HIPs Challenge Mini-Grants 2025

Integrating Experiential Learning and High Impact Practices into students’ programs is a key part of the USG strategic plan and support the Momentum Approach to success by making intentional linkages exemplary teaching and learning, course design, and data collection. Over the past five years, our capacity to recognize, identify, promote, and track student engagement with HIPs has matured considerably, but that work is by no means complete. The HIPs Challenge Mini-Grants provide limited funding for institutions to develop local processes that can amplify the system capacity in this area.

Overview:
The HIPS Challenge Mini-Grant Program will support institutions in strengthening their processes for validating, documenting, and evaluating HIPs on campus. This project will enhance System capacity through institutional exploration in these critical areas, ultimately benefiting faculty, staff, and students through improved tracking and assessment mechanisms. Up to 10 awards of up to $5,000 each will be provided to institutions working in one of the following key areas:

  1. Developing Protocols and Procedures for Reviewing and Evaluating HIPs Course Proposals:
    Projects in this area will establish and document a scalable process for the review and approval of HIPs attribution for courses.  Among other things, projects may include the creation of playbooks and workflows for review teams, documentation of evidence and definitions for individual High-Impact Practices and how these can be used to support proposals for course-level HIPs documentation. Creating structured guidelines for reviewing and documenting HIPs within the student information system ensures a consistent and transparent approach to recognizing HIPs across various departments and disciplines and ensures proposals for HIPs attributes meet the recognized requirements and expectations of the practice.
  2. Documenting Procedures for Recording Course Attributes: Projects in this area will develop and document clear processes for developing and tracking course attributes proposals, through to the documentation of the HIP in Banner, as well as processes for periodic re-affirmation of the attribute.  Effective projects will support HIPs promotion, institutional reporting, and student engagement in HIP-designated courses.
  3. Integrating HIPs across a program of study, or into General Education:  Projects in this area will outline and document the implementation for integrating courses with High Impact Practices across an entire program of study or into General Education (or both). Specific focus should be on creating clear pathways for students by embedding HIPs into courses within their program of study, with the intensity of these practices increasing as student advance on their academic journey.
  4. Assessing and Evaluating HIPs in the Classroom: Projects in this area will design and document methods for evaluating HIPs to measure their impact on student learning and success. Evaluation procedures should extend beyond the application of existing VALUE (or other) rubrics to include processes around documentation, specifications for different disciplines, and the use of measures to improve practices.

Successful projects must produce guidance documents, templates, playbooks or other artifacts that can be shared with other institutions to aid in System implementation efforts. These resources will serve as a foundation for best practices and contribute to a broader effort to institutionalize HIPs effectively. Additionally, programs will be reviewed on the following criteria:  feasibility, institutional impact, student impact, scalability, and sustainability. These resources will serve as a foundation for best practices and contribute to a broader effort to institutionalize HIPs effectively. Projects must be completed by June 1, 2026. 

Submission Information:
Institutions may submit up to three proposals; each proposal must affirm approval by the Provost’s office. Proposals should be submitted online at https://usgsurveys.usg.edu/zs/0rC4by by March 17, 2025.  Please forward any questions to jonathan.hull@usg.edu. Awards will be announced by March 31st, 2025.

This program represents an opportunity for institutions to strengthen their High-Impact Practices and contribute to a growing body of knowledge and best practices that will benefit students and educators across multiple campuses. We look forward to reviewing your proposals and supporting innovative approaches to HIPs implementation.