Press Release
For Immediate Release
For More Information Contact:
- Pete Cookingham, Turfgrass Information Center at (517) 353-7209 or by email at cooking1@msu.edu;
- Ellen Watson, The Toro Foundation at (952) 887-8811, www.toro.com
Date: February 14, 2003
Toro Foundation Supports Turfgrass Information Center at Michigan State University
The Turfgrass Information Center at Michigan State University announced today that The Toro Foundation has awarded a grant of $11,000 to the Center. The Turfgrass Information Center indexes and abstracts the literature of turfgrass, making this information available online via the Turfgrass Information File (TGIF). The Center has been processing current literature for nearly twenty years, growing the TGIF to more than 85,000 entries, but has not been able to systematically address non-USGA materials published prior to the establishment of the Center in 1984. This grant will enable the Center to begin this effort. Clifford Haka, director of the MSU Libraries in which the Center is located, expressed his appreciation indicating, "This grant will enable the Center to initiate an effort to complete the retrospective inclusion of all historical turfgrass research."
The Turfgrass Information File is a unique and essential tool currently utilized by students, researchers and practitioners associated with turfgrass. Stacy Bogart, The Toro Foundation's president noted, "The expansion of TGIF to include historical resources, much of which underpins contemporary turf practice, will further enhance the utility of the database, and is the reason that the Toro Foundation is pleased to provide our support with this grant."
The Turfgrass Information Center is currently supported by subscription fees for the Turfgrass Information File and, in part, by an endowment that has been generously supported by the United States Golf Association, the American Society of Golf Course Architects and the Golf Course Superintendents Association of America, among others.
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