President's Global Innovation Fund

Launched in March 2013 by Columbia University President Lee C. Bollinger, the President’s Global Innovation Fund is designed to provide support for faculty who would like to use the resources or facilities of one or more of the University’s nine Global Centers for teaching or research activities. The Columbia Global Centers are a network of regional hubs intended to enhance the quality of research and learning at the University.

The fund awards grants for faculty members to leverage and engage Columbia’s global centers network. The program is designed as a venture fund to enable the development of projects and research collaborations within and across these sites, in order to increase global opportunities for research, teaching and service. 

Projects must engage with at least one of Columbia’s Global Centers. Projects may be based in a city where a Columbia Global Center is located, or in other locations in the regions served by a global center, as long as they continue to leverage and engage Columbia’s global centers network. Leveraging the global centers will enable the centers and their staff to go beyond their operational capacity–often providing support, counsel, and a network of contacts to concretize and supplement existing research and programming goals.