McCormick Family Foundation grant broadens access to online information resources at Elizabethtown College

$25,000 grant continues organization's decade-long commitment to nurturing student learning through High Library

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ELIZABETHTOWN, PA (07/29/2010)(readMedia)-- With a July 2010 gift to Elizabethtown College, the McCormick Family Foundation is broadening student access to 21st-century information resources available through Elizabethtown College's High Library. The $25,000 grant continues a long-term relationship between the Foundation and the College that is enhancing student learning, supporting the College's healthy and growing research program, and creating organic opportunities for student collaboration.

For more than 10 years, The McCormick Family Foundation has had a continuing connection with Elizabethtown College's High Library. In August 1999, the Foundation created the McCormick Research Laboratory, which is the most heavily used computer laboratory at the College. Since opening, thousands of Elizabethtown students have been introduced to online research and connected to the library's ever-expanding collection of online resources through the Research Laboratory.

Seeking to broaden the impact of the Research Laboratory, the College created a computer laptop lending program during the 2007-2008 academic year through a grant from The McCormick Family Foundation. Steadily growing in popularity, the highly successful program allows students to access the College's wireless computer network from any location in the High Library. This flexibility is creating opportunities for student project collaboration. It also supports the diverse study styles of the College's student body-allowing them to complete research, projects and papers in the way that is most comfortable for them.

According to High Library Director BethAnn Zambella, the new grant from The McCormick Family Foundation seeks to expand the laptop lending program, which has now reached its capacity. "In the past year, the lending program has seen significant growth and now benefits upwards of 250 students each day," says Zambella. "We are grateful to The McCormick Family Foundation for providing the funding to create and now to expand this incredibly successful program, which is nurturing student learning at the High Library."

The High Library has been a valuable resource for Elizabethtown students and central Pennsylvania residents for more than two decades. Housing an estimated 200,000 books and an expanding collection of online resources, the facility provides visitors with access to a world of knowledge seven days per week during the academic year and weekdays during the summer. Through their efforts, the High Library staff connects people with ideas and creates an intellectual and cultural commons-both physical and virtual-where individuals can experience the power of sharing information.

Elizabethtown College, in southeastern Pennsylvania, is a private coed college with degrees in liberal arts, fine and performing arts, science and engineering, business, communications and education. The hallmarks of an Elizabethtown education are academic rigor, high expectations and intellectual curiosity. Our faculty members are teacher-scholars, pursuing their academic areas of expertise while sharing that expertise with students.

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