Dean's Excellence Fund in Agriculture
This fund is used according to greatest need as determined by the Vice President, Dean and Director of Agricultural Programs to include, but not limited to, scholarships, academic support, student programs and facilities.
Make a gift toward the DASNR Dean's Excellence Fund in Agriculture
Top of page ^
DASNR Scholarship Needs
CASNR Enhancement Scholarship Fund
This fund is used directly for scholarships to students in the College of Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resources, to supplement other scholarship monies that may not be sufficient to meet the intended scholarship level. Also, it adds to the corpus of the CASNR endowed scholarship accounts so that they may be awarded at their intended level.
Immediate Need: $4,000 annually
Goal: $100,000 endowment
Make a gift toward CASNR Enhancement Scholarship Fund
Academic Scholarships for Undergraduate Students in CASNR
Scholarships for undergraduate students based on academic performance and/or need are increasingly important. Scholarships are a critical component in the recruitment and retention of the very best students to our academic programs. Our objective is to increase the award level of current College of Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resources scholarships, increase the total number of scholarships and provide for new scholarship opportunities in specialized areas. Individual donors are crucial in obtaining and recruiting top students.
Make a gift toward Academic Scholarships for Undergraduate Students in CASNR
Top of page ^
Endowed Chair Needs
Endowed Chair in Animal Systems Management (Animal Science)
This individual will not only have nationally-recognized expertise in management of farms and ranches with an appreciation of both biological needs of those enterprises but also economic and environmental impacts of practices on those enterprises. This individual will have primarily a teaching and research appointment in order to prepare the next generation of farmers and ranchers, and may also serve extension needs.
Immediate Need: $500,000
Goal: $2,000,000 endowment
Make a gift toward an Endowed Chair in Animal Systems Management (Animal Science)
Endowed Chair in Muscle Biology and Muscle Foods (Animal Science/Food and Agricultural Products Center)
This individual will have nationally-recognized expertise in meat and muscle biology with great appreciation for the practical aspects of the meats industry. The position will be primarily in the research and teaching area, but this senior-level faculty member will also have the experience and skill to serve some extension needs. This position will capture an existing strength of the close relationship between the Department of Animal Science with the Robert M. Kerr Food and Agricultural Products Center and the strong existing interaction of both groups with the meats industry. This is a logical addition to our faculty in a state that has a tremendously large beef industry and a very significant meats industry.
Immediate Need: $500,000
Goal: $2,000,000 endowment
Make a gift toward an Endowed Chair in Muscle Biology and Muscle Foods (Animal Science/Food and Agricultural Products Center)
Endowed Chair in Bioenergy (Biosystems and Agricultural Engineering)
The production of ethanol from cellulosic sources is an important part of America’s energy future. Those investing significant resources in this research area include the Oklahoma Bioenergy Center and federal agencies. A strong multidisciplinary and multi-institutional research team is in place, but through an endowed chair/professorship, there is a clear opportunity to enhance our work and our visibility in the biofuels arena. Such a position will be a catalyst for even greater success in bioenergy research at OSU and is a great accompaniment to the creation of a new center in this area. Bioenergy is a focus area for the department, division, university, state and nation. Renewable energy helps to decrease our country’s dependence on foreign oil, reduce global warming and spur rural economic development. Oklahoma is well-positioned to be a leading state in the coming bioenergy era.
Immediate Need: $500,000
Goal: $2,000,000 endowment
Make a gift toward an Endowed Chair in Bioenergy (Biosystems and Agricultural Engineering)
Endowed Chair in Food Processing (Food and Agricultural Products Center)
This Endowed Chair in Food Processing will be a position in food science and technology with a complete focus on applied food value-added processing. This position will address issues in food processing across all foods including meat and poultry, cereal grains, horticultural products, and beverages that are grown and processed or potentially grown and processed in Oklahoma. The position will address immediate and critical issues in food processing and best manufacturing practices associated with the use of new processing technologies and new food ingredients. Finally, this position will address longer-term creative food product needs and food processing innovation needs for new food processes, new food ingredients and new manufacturing knowledge to allow the Oklahoma food industry to continue to grow and expand in this very competitive but opportunistic area.
Immediate Need: $500,000
Goal: $2,000,000 endowment
Make a gift toward an Endowed Chair in Food Processing (Food and Agricultural Products Center)
Endowed Chair in Fire Ecology/Management in the Urban/Wildland Interface (Natural Resource Ecology and Management)
This position will provide leadership in developing an international program in the management of fuels and fires in the interface between urban population centers and wildlands. This position will be a joint research and teaching position that will solidify the reputation of the Department of Natural Resource Ecology and Management, and Oklahoma State University as the leader in understanding and managing prescribed and wild fires.
Immediate Need: $500,000
Goal: $2,000,000 endowment
Make a gift toward an Endowed Chair in Fire Ecology/Management in the Urban/Wildland Interface (Natural Resource Ecology and Management)
Henry Bellmon Chair in Bioenergy (Plant and Soil Sciences)
The primary goal of this chair will be to develop new, improved high-tonnage forage sorghums, grain sorghums and sweet sorghums for use as feedstocks for conversion to transportation fuel grade ethanol. Objectives include: assemble global sorghum genetic stocks, breed superior sorghum cultivars and hybrids adapted to Oklahoma production settings, and work closely with ethanol industry to incorporate novel genetic traits to optimize ethanol conversion efficiencies. Oklahoma and Oklahoma State University are posed to jump-start an exciting new renewable energy industry based on conversion of cellulosic feedstocks to ethanol for transportation fuels. One of the most promising sources of biofuels feedstock for Oklahoma production systems is high-tonnage sorghum. This crop is capable of providing massive amounts of feedstock per acre with minimal production inputs. Unfortunately, most varieties of this type of sorghum available today were not bred for maximum performance under Oklahoma environments. Some improved sorghums are being developed for Texas production, but have already been licensed to a private company. Oklahoma needs genetically improved, high-performance sorghums developed specifically for Oklahoma production systems to feed this exciting new bioenergy industry. This endowed chair is created to honor Gov. Henry Bellmon.
Immediate Need: $1,000,000
Goal: $4,000,000 endowment
Make a gift toward an Henry Bellmon Chair in Bioenergy (Plant and Soil Sciences)
Endowed Chair in Equine
This position will assist with the teaching and extension needs such as but not limited to: 1) Organization of county and district extension educator support programs for youth equine activities, including the development and evaluation of a structured volunteer leader certification system with appropriate support materials and activities. 2) Coordination of horse-related state and district-level cooperative extension events with county, district and state-level extension staff and faculty, including 4-H youth horse shows, judging and management events. 3) Provision of additional instruction/advising/support for undergraduates related to equine subject matter and other activities as appropriate. A strong emphasis will be placed on a demonstrated ability to interact and collaborate effectively with colleagues in animal science, 4-H and youth development, and to contribute to DASNR Second Century Initiative Teams.
Immediate Need: $500,000
Goal: $1,000,000
Make a gift toward an Endowed Chair in Equine
Endowed Professorship Needs
Endowed Professorship in Animal Behavior and Welfare (Animal Science)
This individual will not only have nationally-recognized expertise in this broad discipline, but could also have more focused expertise in animal ethology, environmental physiology or immunology. Future major advances in animal management are likely to come from this area of investigation. Animal industries are “at risk” because we do not generate enough data in this discipline to adequately defend our common practices. Furthermore, this position will be a tremendous help in serving the needs of our rapidly expanding pool of students with a primary interest in companion animals. Thus, this position will be a huge asset in serving our teaching and research missions and will substantially enhance our ability to recruit new students.
Immediate Need: $250,000
Goal: $1,000,000 endowment
Make a gift toward an Endowed Professorship in Animal Behavior and Welfare (Animal Science)
Professorship in Animal Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (Animal Science/Biochemistry and Molecular Biology)
The Endowed Professorship in Animal Biochemistry and Molecular Biology will stimulate directed basic research to the problems of production agriculture in the area of animal sciences. Fundamental mechanistic research is essential to develop the next generation of ideas that can be translated into applications to benefit production agriculture. The explicit responsibility of this endowed position will be to focus on mechanistic research problems using model systems that can be directly translated into large animal production.
Immediate Need: $250,000
Goal: $1,000,000 endowment
Make a gift toward a Professorship in Animal Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (Animal Science/Biochemistry and Molecular Biology)
Professorship in Bioinformatics and Computational Biology (Biochemistry and Molecular Biology)
Unraveling the complexity of life is the goal of modern biochemistry and molecular biology. Understanding the many levels of biological complexity from cells to ecosystems has applications that impact all levels of our society from agriculture to medicine to public policy. Historically, the lack of adequate technology has limited our ability to ask the questions that are fundamental to our ability to understand the complexity of living systems; however, the advent of high performance analytical technologies in the 21st century is now producing an explosion of data that can be generated in short periods of time. The primary bottleneck is converting this overwhelming amount of data into useful information. Bioinformatics and computational biology is a rapidly expanding field that is developing the computational technologies that are required to convert data into information. Bioinformatics and Computational Biology is a rapidly growing field that encompasses both undergraduate and graduate education and research. Such a program will encompass the varied disciplines of biochemistry, biology, chemistry, computer science, mathematics, statistics and related areas. Interestingly, there are faculty members on the OSU campus in all of these disciplines that have experience and interest in this evolving field. This endowed professorship will act as a nucleus to develop a comprehensive academic and research program in bioinformatics and computational biology.
Immediate Need: $250,000
Goal: $1,000,000 endowment
Make a gift toward an Professorship in Bioinformatics and Computational Biology (Biochemistry and Molecular Biology)
Professorship in Precision Agriculture Technologies (Plant and Soil Sciences/Biosystems and Agricultural Engineering)
For more than 15 years, a multidisciplinary team of DASNR researchers has established an international reputation in the application of sensor technologies to “on-the-go” variable-rate application of nitrogen fertilizer. Due to advances in technology and the ever-present economic and environmental pressures, precision agriculture is a rapidly-evolving area of opportunity for research, development and application. It is an obvious area of strength for OSU, and due to recent and potential future retirements, it will be especially beneficial to recruit an outstanding engineer to this new professorship position. Precision agriculture technologies provide many opportunities for enhanced management of crop and animal systems. Advances in monitoring, sensing and control systems make it possible to apply these technologies in economically attractive and environmentally sustainable ways.
Immediate Need: $250,000
Goal: $1,000,000 endowment
Make a gift toward a Professorship in Precision Agriculture Technologies (Plant and Soil Sciences/Biosystems and Agricultural Engineering)
Endowed Professorship in Host Plant Resistance (Entomology and Plant Pathology)
The movement of production agriculture into other avenues such as biofuels, biosecurity and bioinformatics is creating emerging markets for commodity-based programs. To answer the needs of these emphases, it will become important to explore traditional and molecular means of breeding new plant cultivars for resistance to new and emerging plant pests, including arthropods and disease organisms. The primary goal of this program will be to continually develop and/or explore the new transgenic technologies through traditional and molecular investigations. A major focus will be on collaboration with industry in new transgenic markets for transforming plants with resistance to arthropod pests and plant diseases. Evaluation of the economic and environmental impacts of resistant genes and their longevity in the marketplace represents a constant concern for the industry and helps identify pest management methods that can be integrated into overall management plans for production agriculture around the world.
Immediate Need: $250,000
Goal: $1,000,000 endowment
Make a gift toward a Endowed Professorship in Host Plant Resistance (Entomology and Plant Pathology)
Endowed Professorship in Environmental Landscape Horticulture (Horticulture and Landscape Architecture)
This position will contribute to DASNR’s water-related environmental programs and those of the departments, including our comprehensive Integrated Environmental Research and Education Site (IERES- pronounced Iris) efforts. Particular areas of research will include sustainable landscape construction and development; ground water recharge, reuse and conservation mechanisms using landscape construction materials and design practices; evaluation and use of plant materials to address plant stresses (drought, heat, cold); water, remediation, and energy conservation issues and green roof applications for the urban environment; and landscape designs for enhanced human health, well-being and/or resources. This position will significantly contribute to the support and enhancement of our landscape teaching program providing significant opportunities to increase our course offerings related to landscape sustainable practices especially sustainable low-impact development and construction practices/applications related to water management and use in the environment.
The landscape service and construction industry is expanding in Oklahoma and is forecasted to grow at 6 percent to 8 percent per year for the next 15 years as baby boomers reach retirement. As urbanization continues, an undeniable trend in increased conversion from rural agricultural to urbanized landscapes will occur. Competition for water and land use-related issues will be significant. This position will strengthen DASNR’s research efforts related to its urban environmental initiatives, contribute to solving issues related land and water use, and support our department’s IERES efforts.
Immediate Need: $250,000
Goal: $1,000,000 endowment
Make a gift toward a Endowed Professorship in Environmental Landscape Horticulture (Horticulture and Landscape Architecture)
Endowed Professorship in Horticulture Natural Products (Horticulture and Landscape Architecture)
New product development for industry expansion and profitability will be targeted with specific emphasis on nutraceutical and pharmaceutical industries/products. The department has a very active extraction research program underway lead by Dr. Niels Maness and partially funded by corporate sponsors such as ATEP (Ambient Temperature Extraction Partners) and others as a joint industry-university effort for the study of low pressure/low temperature extraction processing. In addition to corporate supporters, this is a university-driven multidisciplinary program with participants from horticulture and landscape architecture, food processing, biosystems and agricultural engineering, and chemical engineering. This position will significantly contribute to DASNR’s and our departmental research goals, support industry partnerships via cooperative research efforts, stimulate economic development within the state, and further position OSU toward becoming a world leader in low pressure/low temperature extraction processing in nutraceutical and pharmaceutical product development from natural products. This new position will have access to the new extraction equipment prototypes developed by Dr. Maness and his industry partners.
Immediate Need: $250,000
Goal: $1,000,000 endowment
Make a gift toward a Endowed Professorship in Horticulture Natural Products (Horticulture and Landscape Architecture)
Make a gift to the College of Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resources
|
