Moran announces $33.5 million in federal grants for K-State Salina

A total of $33.5 million is coming to the Kansas State University Salina Aerospace and Technology Campus thanks to funding from the federal government.

That's the news that Sen. Jerry Moran announced to a standing room only crowd of students, faculty and guests Tuesday afternoon.

While he said he is of the view that the federal government spends too much money, Moran acknowledged that when money is budgeted, he wants to make sure some of it finds its way to Kansas, particularly in the aerospace and aviation sector.

"If we only educate and train our...students at K-State Salina, but they have no future in Kansas, we've only modestly changed the future of our state," Moran said. "The goal is to (have both education and job opportunities)."

To help reach that goal, Moran announced that a number of grants have been awarded to K-State Salina amounting to $33.5 million total.

What is K-State Salina doing with this $33.5 million?

In his announcement, Moran said these grants will be used in several different ways at K-State Salina, including construction costs for an aerospace innovation and training hub on the campus and for operations, research and facilities for a full-motion simulator.

Moran said part of the responsibilities of the Senate Committee on Appropriations, which he is a member of, is the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), which will benefit from some of this funding.

"Somehow, NOAA is looking for the training (of) pilots to hunt hurricanes," Moran said. "We're working to give NOAA all the tools to train their workforce in Salina, Kansas, presumably a long way away from hurricanes. They chose us because of the capabilities of K-State Salina, of the dean, the faculty and the students."

Alysia Starkey, CEO and dean of K-State Salina, went further in discussing how the campus will use this newly announced grant funding.

"This round of funding will be used to construct the Aerospace Innovation Training Hub, the state-of-the-art facility that co-locates our uncrewed aircraft systems (UAS), aviation maintenance and composites programs," Starkey said. "These programs are imperative to the future aviation and for the evolutions of advanced air mobility in the state."

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Starkey said the facility will also house the college's applied aerospace research center, allowing research to continue expanding into the emerging aerospace technology industry.

"(The center will be) supporting advanced air mobility in commercial space applications, including electric vehicle take-off and landing, electric propulsion and other future industry needs in the aerospace industry," Starkey said.

Additionally, Starkey said the new facility will allow the campus to double the size of allocated space for aviation maintenance training for educational opportunities at all levels from technical certificates to doctor's degree credentials.

"(This will) help expand the workforce needs in Kansas and beyond," Starkey said.

Finally, the facility will house the K-State Salina advanced composites laboratory.

"This will be a state-of-the-art laboratory delivering holistic education on composites materials, providing an immersive and industry-driven learning experience for students and industry partners," Starkey said.

Leaders excited about the recent and future opportunities at K-State Salina

Moran joined K-State President Richard Linton after the announcement and talked about the many programs, projects, grants, funding opportunities and more the Salina campus has been able to accomplish over the past few years.

"This is a series of maybe three grants over the last couple or three years to benefit the cause of K-State Salina, but also benefit the cause of Kansas," Moran said.

Moran noted that Kansas has been a major center of the aviation and aerospace industry for decades and said investing in innovation and education in the industry will help the state stay that way.

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"Technology, science and discoveries are moving us faster forward, and we need to make sure the institutions of our state, in this case, Kansas State University, has the resources, the assets, the faculty and the facilities to make certain that that advanced research is taking place here," Moran said. "Businesses will find us because of that."

The senator said that by having multiple aspects of the aviation industry represented in one place, it helps to diversify the Kansas economy.

"For a long time, we've been pretty dependent on general aviation manufacturing and on commercial aviation for planes that fly across the country," Moran said. "We are working to make sure we expand that so that we avoid some of the ups and downs of the economy."

He noted the situations with the Boeing 737 Max and during the pandemic that have decreased the demand of commercial air service, and said that moving into other parts of the aerospace industry was important.

"We're trying to make certain that Kansas is an air capital of the world for defense and space," Moran said.

President Linton said research universities like K-State have to be able to be on the forefront of that research.

"It's the job of a land-grant university...to work with industry to be in front, so that we're creating opportunities for economic growth in new technologies," Linton said. "But it's also about the workforce of the future, so I think it's important that (we're) involved in moving this industry forward in Kansas."

This article originally appeared on Salina Journal: K-State Salina receiving $33.5 million in federal grants