2024 grants for retirees
UMRA’s Professional Development Grants for Retirees (PDGR) program is an annual competition with applications accepted October 1 to December 31. It provides financial support for University retirees to continue scholarship or pursue new projects. Retirees from all five campuses within the U of M System are eligible whether or not they are members of UMRA. Funding of up to $5,000 per grant is available.
Since 2009, PDGR grants have been awarded to more than 110 retirees. Recent award recipients have focused on projects as varied as insect biodiversity in Ecuador, Minnesota's human rights stories, and temper outbursts in psychiatrically referred youth. You can find more information about the program, including the instructions for applying for 2024 funding, at umra.umn.edu > Serving You > Grants for Retirees. Please consider making an application.
If you have previously contributed to the PDGR program, thank you for your support. If you have not yet contributed or, if you would like to make another tax-deductible contribution, you can do so online at z.umn.edu/PDGR.
You can also make a tax-efficient gift from an IRA if you are age 70½ or older. Contact Lynn Praska, senior planned giving officer, U of M Foundation, at [email protected] or 612-624-4158.
Email John Bantle, MD, PDGR Committee chair, if you have questions or suggestions for the grant program.
News
If you or someone you know would be a good candidate for president-elect or a position on the UMRA Board of Directors, please contact one of the eight members of UMRA’s 2025 Nominating Committee.
Meet Michael Luxenberg, the new co-leader of the UMRA Hiking Club. A retired data analyst and entrepreneur, he met his wife, UMRA member and Professor Emerita Joan Garfield, when both were grad students at the U of M and rode the campus bus from Minneapolis to St. Paul.
Former President Jimmy Carter’s version of “retirement” was remarkable. What if all U of M retirees started the new year stepping up our efforts to make the world better?
The UMRA-sponsored Journal of Opinions, Ideas & Essays has added three videos to its online collection of original publications by UMRA members.
Now is an especially good time to support the UMRA grants program because all gifts made by December 31 will be doubled thanks to a challenge grant. Contributions are tax-deductible.
Kathy Cramer retired from the University as an associate professor of mathematics education and has some good advice for older adults interested in tutoring children: Don’t teach them what you learned.
Do you have ideas for people who might be good candidates to serve on UMRA’s Board of Directors or as president-elect? If so, please consider volunteering to join the Nominating Committee for UMRA’s 2025 elections. It’s a modest commitment, but important.