Alaska Pacific University

Alaska Pacific University (APU) is a private, non-profit Alaska Native-serving institution founded in 1959 and based in Anchorage, Alaska. The university is committed to honoring Alaska's Indigenous heritage while delivering specialized research, education, and community engagement services. Through its federal contracting and grant portfolio, APU provides the federal government with environmental research, data analysis, educational programming, workforce development, and scientific expertise focused on addressing critical challenges facing Alaska's communities, particularly those related to climate change, fisheries management, and Indigenous knowledge integration.

APU's federal contract work demonstrates substantial expertise in specialized research and data analysis services. The university has received purchase orders and cooperative agreements from multiple federal agencies including the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), and the U.S. Shared Services Center. Specific contract deliverables have included glacier data collection and environmental monitoring for the Eklutna Glacier Data and Access project ($23,575), fisheries effects modeling to determine areas of suppressed crab populations ($38,893), and incorporation of validated coral and sponge covariates into fishing effects models ($14,900). Most notably, APU received a substantial $4.91 million cooperative agreement from the Shared Services Center to establish and operate the Alaska Pacific University Microplastics Research and Education Center, a five-year initiative running through September 2029. All of APU's federal contracts have been awarded on a non-set-aside basis, reflecting the university's competitive positioning and technical capabilities in environmental science and resource management domains.

APU's federal grant portfolio reflects the institution's broad research and educational mission, with prime grant awards totaling millions of dollars across multiple federal agencies and programs. The National Science Foundation has been a significant funder, awarding APU a $2.75 million Project Grant for research on host-pathogen dynamics in Pacific herring across thermal gradients, a $916,096 grant addressing water and sanitation resilience in rural Alaska under climate scenarios, and support for the "Frozen Commons" collaborative research project on Arctic sustainability. The Department of Education's Office of Postsecondary Education awarded APU a $985,000 Project Grant for the Competency-Based Apprenticeship for Teacher Education in Alaska (CATE-AK) program. The Denali Commission provided $437,726 for the Alaska Rural Management Expansion project addressing infrastructure and climate adaptation in rural Alaskan communities. The Employment and Training Administration funded the Alaska Nursing Expansion Initiative with nearly $3 million to expand nursing degree programs across the state. APU has also received cooperative agreements from the U.S. Geological Survey ($22AC00527) for surficial geologic mapping and from the National Institutes of Health for sponsored programs administrative development. Additionally, APU serves as a sub-awardee on multiple federal grants, including North Pacific Research Board fisheries research projects, NSF's Navigating the New Arctic (NNA) initiatives, and various disaster recovery projects with the Alaska Department of Military and Veteran's Affairs, demonstrating its role as a collaborative partner in Arctic research and Indigenous community engagement initiatives.