The three-year program will create an intense, in-service education project for 12 faculty members who would teach a third to half of each new freshman class in first semester courses. It is being funded by a $100,000 grant from the Indianapolis-based Lumina Foundation for Education.

The project will enable faculty to understand the reading habits and cognitive abilities of technologically-oriented freshmen, said Paul Ranieri, project coordinator and interim associate dean of the College of Sciences and Humanities.

"For the last few years faculty have been faced with teaching new students who have spent a great deal of time in front of computer monitors," Ranieri said. "These students read and think smoothly within this verbal-visual medium.

"Faculty are more print oriented. We were raised on books. The key is to give the faculty the time and the tools to better understand this verbal-visual medium as well as the reading and thinking habits of students. By approaching learning in this new way, we can become better educators and hopefully improve retention rates as well as education levels."

Ranieri said his project builds on Ball State's current retention programs, including Freshman Connections. The innovative program links students in small living and learning groups organized around common courses and out-of-class experiences.

Ball State is one of six Indiana universities to receive funding from the foundation through the "President's Fund for Student Success in the First and Second Years of College." The foundation will fund projects to improve retention of first- and second-year students.

Other schools include Indiana State University, Indiana University-Bloomington, Purdue University, University of Notre Dame and Indiana University Purdue University-Indianapolis.

Lumina Foundation for Education, a private, independent foundation, strives to help people achieve their potential by expanding access and success in education beyond high school.

(NOTE TO EDITORS: For more information, contact Ranieri at pranieri@bsu.eduor (765) 286-1042.)