The Virginia Sapiro Academic Enhancement Fund (AEF) enables CAS faculty members to build unique learning opportunities into their undergraduate CAS course syllabi, using historic and contemporary Boston as an extended classroom and taking advantage of the city and University as magnets for leading academics, artists, and experts. The events or activities should be complementary or enriching; other sources of funding should be sought to support activities that are integral to the course design or that provide a required component of the curriculum. Awards are typically between $300 and $500 and usually capped at two awards per semester. Application link located at bottom of page.
Common uses of funds include, but are not limited to:
- Cultural experiences
- Visiting exhibitions
- Guest speakers (honoraria not to exceed $250/person)
- Live performances (e.g., plays)
- Field trips (e.g., museums, research facilities)
- Experiential course materials (i.e. new tools to be used for a one-semester trial)
Funds may not be requested/used for:
- Local transportation expenses for locations that are accessible by the T or bus lines
- Standard course materials (materials needed every semester)
- Recurring events (e.g., events occurring or required every semester)
- Events that have occurred before the submission of the funding request
Featured Events Funded by the AEF
Students in Professor Christopher Walsh’s course “Living the American Revolution” (WR 120) took a trip to Fort Washington Park in Cambridgeport, which was built by the Continental Army in November 1775. Accompanied by a professional tour guide, the class discussed the history of this local landmark and the history of Boston as an important location in Revolutionary era America.
- For Senior Lecturer Veronica Rodriguez Ballesteros’ “Third Semester Spanish” (LS 211) and “Intensive Spanish” (LS 123) courses, students had the opportunity to attend the Boston Latino International Film Festival to learn more about LatinX identities and cultures through film. Their experiences at the Festival helped to inform the students’ own work on virtual community-building projects with Hispanic communities in the United States.
- For the course AA/EN 132, “Write Back Soon: Black Writing and the Prison,” Assistant Professor Ianna Owen invited two speakers for a joint discussion: Robin Levi, an editor and lawyer who wrote “In This Place, Not Of It: Narratives From Women’s Prisons,” a collection of incarceration testimonies that explores carceral conditions and incarceration’s relationship with the absence of social services; and Kelli Dillon, a formerly incarcerated woman who provided one of testimonies in Levi’s work. Both women held a dialogue on the causes of and impacts on the incarceration of under-served women, providing students with an opportunity to speak directly with an editor and an author engaged in studying the prison system.
- The BU student group Liquid Fun led performance workshops on improvisational comedy for two sections of Senior Lecturer Kevin Barents’ WR 151 course “Improvisation Now!” Students learned about fundamental improv skills and techniques, watched scenes performed by the group, and participated in their own improv comedy exercises to better understand improvisational theater.
- Language students from courses of all levels in the Japanese Program (in the World Literatures and Languages Department) hosted a cultural exchange on the BU campus with recently-arrived Japanese students from the Showa Boston Institute. The impacts of the pandemic have made it difficult for students to travel abroad for immersive experiences, and this social gathering helped students from both BU and the Showa Boston Institute connect with native speakers and share cultural experiences.
- To learn about radio journalism and podcasting techniques, students in Associate Professor Benjamin Siegel’s HI 525 course, “Development in Global Perspective,” met virtually with NPR reporters Laurel Wamsley and Simone Popperl to learn about the planning and production of radio shows. The journalistic expertise of these reporters helped to inform the creation of a collective class podcast about the history of a selected development project.
- For the WR 152 course “Examining Graphic Medicine,” Lecturer Katherine Stebbins invited Dr. Ben Schwartz (Chief Creative Officer at the Columbia University Medical Center & a New Yorker cartoonist) and Whit Taylor (cartoonist, editor, and comics writer) to speak on their experiences with medicine and graphic art. The speakers and the students discussed the use of comics to communicate the history of science and medicine, the experiences of physicians and patients, and the challenges of public health education.
The fund is administered by CAS Associate Dean for Student Academic Life Steve Jarvi (sjarvi@bu.edu) and the CAS Dean’s Office. Each request is evaluated on a rolling basis. Please be sure to allot ample time between your funding request submission and the date on which you will need the funding. Funding requests submitted too close to the date of an event, speaker, etc., are not guaranteed to be reviewed, and funding requests submitted for events that have already occurred will not be granted.
If your request is approved, the College will require the submission of a written description of:
- How the funds were used
- The benefits derived by use of the funds, as well as photos, when applicable.
Submission is required within two weeks of the event for reimbursement.
The AEF does not provide funding for summer classes or graduate-level classes. This application process is for undergraduate CAS courses only.
The Fall 2023 Application is now closed.
Funds are limited, and the application will be closed when they are exhausted. Applications will reopen again ahead of academic year 2024-2025, with updated guidelines. Please note that as we work to update the AEF guidelines, funding will pause, and no awards will be granted for Spring 2024.
Questions may be directed to sjarvi@bu.edu.