COLTS NECK — The Colts Neck K-8 School District PTO is providing $19,640 in mini-grants for the 2011-12 school year’s Excellence in Teaching Grants program.
The mini-grants will allow selected teachers to add a new element to the classroom through supplementary educational projects, PTO President Kim Largey said.
“A lot of times, the mini-grants are for something different that students are not necessarily getting as part of the regular curriculum,” Largey said.
That could include everything from traveling science shows and touring theater presentations to service learning projects and butterfly gardens that will be financed by the grants, Superintendent of Schools Fredrik Oberkehr said.
PTO members chose the grant recipients based upon the number of students who would benefit from each proposal, the inclusion of grade levels and the quality of the submissions.
“We had to pick the best projects that will have the most impact on our students,” Largey said. “We try to spread it out so that every grade has a chance to participate.”
The project in which an individual pupil participates is dependent on grade level, Largey said.
Pupils in the lower grades will mostly experience presentations that are brought to their classroom, Largey said, adding that visiting authors are a regular part of the program for the younger children.
“Every year we always approve a grant for a visiting author,” Largey said. “The visiting author comes in, sits with the children and talks with them about what it’s like to be an author.”
Middle school students may benefit from community service projects and PTOsponsored scholarships to attend outside science enrichment programs, Largey said.
Teachers submitted grant applications in September and the PTO reviewed the requests in early October, Largey said. The teachers who applied for grants asked for a total of $48,000 in funding. The PTO awarded 17 grants totaling $19,640.
PTO members divided the funds among the district’s three schools, with $6,100 for the Conover Road Primary School, $6,440 for the Conover Road Elementary School and $7,100 directed toward projects at the Cedar Drive Middle School, Oberkehr said.
Fundraising is the driving force behind the grant program’s success, Largey said. Events that are held throughout the year produce the majority of the money that is used to advance and supplement the education of Colts Neck children, she said.
The district recently received $28,937 in No Child Left Behind (NCLB) federal funds, Oberkehr said.
NCLB grants are based on entitlement, rather than competition, the superintendent said. He said district administrators told the federal government how the grant money would be spent and waited for approval.
Partial funding will be used for classroom resources and professional development for language arts and science teachers, Oberkehr said. He said the district will use its remaining funds to provide transportation to field trips for students.