Posted on March 29, 2009

print  e-mail

Lilly Endowment Awards $20 Million to Boost Northeast Indiana Economy

The Community Foundation of Greater Fort Wayne has announced a $20 million grant to one of its affiliates from the Indianapolis-based Lilly Endowment to accelerate the development of northeast Indiana's workforce and talent resources.

The program, Talent Opportunity Success 2015, will develop education, training, and talent initiatives in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics designed to better prepare the region's workforce for jobs, both in the short and long term. Community Partnerships, Inc., a supporting organization of the community foundation, will oversee the initiative, while day-to-day management of the program will be provided by the Northeast Indiana Foundation, a supporting organization of the Northeast Indiana Regional Partnership.

The initiative will offer programs that target the aerospace and defense industries, with the immediate goal of preparing workers to assume more than four thousand new and replacement jobs in those industries. TOpS 2015 will also work to retrain at least twelve hundred workers over the next three years, enhance the advanced manufacturing program at Ivy Tech - Northeast, expand the systems engineering and wireless technology programs at Indiana University - Purdue University Fort Wayne, and create new technology high schools within school corporations in the region, emphasizing science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) courses.

"Lilly Endowment invited the Community Foundation of Greater Fort Wayne to work together with other community stakeholders to propose a plan to engage the educational and charitable sectors in maximizing the economic development potential of the area," said Lilly Endowment president N. Clay Robbins. "For Indiana communities to thrive in the future, they must have well-educated and competitive workforces."

“Lilly Endowment Awards $20 Million to Promote Northeast Indiana Economy.” Lilly Endowment Inc. Press Release 3/25/09.

Primary Subject: Community Improvement/Development
Secondary Subject(s): Economic Crisis
Location(s): Indiana

FC013203