In 2018, a team from Metropolitan State University, Carleton College, Minneapolis College, and Minnesota Campus Compact received a Multi-Institutional Innovation grant from Bringing Theory to Practice to educate Minnesota campuses about the 2020 Census and mobilize engagement with it.
In the summer of 2019, the team hosted a two-day 2020 Census Planning Institute for Higher Education that brought together some fifty individuals from more than twenty academic institutions and networks across the state. Participants developed curricular materials and action plans to educate and mobilize students. The institute included presentations from the Minnesota State Demographer’s Office and the Minnesota Office of Higher Education, and it offered models for integrating the census into courses and other civic and community engagement projects.
The project team has also provided mini-grants to colleges across the state for curriculum development, as well as action grants to increase participation in the census and ensure a more complete count. They are also reaching to all Minnesota institutions—and offering funding—to organize “complete count” committees.