Federal Relations should be regarded as an important function, since the UW System students benefit from millions of dollars in federal financial aid, work-study, and loan programs. Federal grants and contracts make up approximately 18% of the university’s total revenues. Kristine Andrews, Assistant Vice President for Federal and Corporate Relations, works to increase the UW System’s visibility with both the U.S. Congress and federal agencies and provides the delegation with a central contact and a common voice. She also works to provide campuses with tools to articulate their goals and ways to use these tools to increase participation in, and receive benefits from, the federal government.
Andrews describes her mission as support for the campuses, so they can “…make an even greater contribution to the state in the future, through increased federal support for university research. A special focus has been to help our comprehensive campuses do an even better job of matching the academic and research strengths of their faculty with available federal grant programs.”
Through a Council on Undergraduate Research (CUR)-National Science Foundation (NSF) grant, the four-year institutions of the UW System have been working together to institutionalize undergraduate research throughout the system. Recent studies indicate that undergraduate research has a significant and positive effect on students, faculty and institutions. Students are much more likely to stay in school and to graduate. Faculty are committed to teaching, research, and mentoring their students, and institutions are expanding curriculum to prepare students to be more innovative and entrepreneurial.
As the National Chair of Advocacy for the Council of Undergraduate Research (CUR), Andrews is viewed as a leader in creating a national and international voice for undergraduate research.