2007 Highlights

North Kitsap Education Foundation awarded a total of $5,885 for 16 mini-grants in 2007.   Thirty-four applications were received and evaluated by a committee representing NKEF and the community.

Build a Marimba – Cynthia Gilman – Breidablik Elementary

Ms Gilman will lead a collaboration of parents, students, and a local business to build marimbas for the use of Breidablik student musical groups.

Lights and Shadows - Beverly Godfrey - Vinland Elementary

The grant will allow Ms Godfrey to enhance the first grade unit on lights and shadows with three experiments which require flashlights, batteries, and colored flood lights.

First Grade Art Curriculum – Tracy Zeringer – Poulsbo Elementary

Ms Zeringer is a first year teacher and will purchase art materials to be used in an art curriculum that is integrated with science, math, and language arts units.  The material will be shared with all first grade teachers at Poulsbo.

Traditional Arts of Japan Outside the Classroom – Kari Denton – Kingston High

The grant will help fund activities where the students will experience a tea ceremony, a bonsai activity, and building a Japanese style gate at Kingston High.

Aeronautics for Everyone – Mark Stebbing – Kingston Middle School

Mr. Stebbing will purchase “White Wings” paper airplane kits to provide “hands on” design, construction, and flight test experience for the 7^th grade science unit on aeronautics.

Anatomy Field Trips– Patricia Webster – North Kitsap High School

The grant will help pay for field trips to Harborview Hospital, where a doctor will give a tour of the emergency room and a slide presentation related to physiology and anatomy, and to Pacific Lutheran University where a professor will instruct the students using cadavers.

Five for Life Program – Robert Webb – Breidablik Elementary

Funds will pay for a physical education curriculum that builds the habit of, and an appreciation for, living a fit and healthy life.

Growing Gardens with Wolfle – Maria Steinbeisser – Wolfle Elementary

The grant will help pay for the construction of a wheel chair and walker accessible path through the new garden of native plants, vegetables, and herbs adjacent to the Wolfle playground.

Suquamish Elementary Rhythm and Power Ensemble (SERAPE) – Tamera Rabura – Suquamish Elementary

The school will purchase additional drums for the growing musical group.

Sustainability Curriculum and Pea Patch – Bob Geballe – Spectrum Community School

Mr Geballe is developing a “Sustainability” curriculum for high school students, part of which is creating a vegetable garden at the school.  Grant funds will be used to buy supplies for students to use to build the garden enclosure, provide irrigation, and purchase seeds and plants.

Discrepant Events – Jerrine Gabrio – Breidablik Elementary

Funds will be used to buy materials for an original integrated science and writing curriculum which uses “discrepant events” (unexpected results) as its theme.

Guided Language Acquisition Design (GLAD) Application– Laurie Harney – Poulsbo Elementary

Ms Harney will purchase visual aids to use with her fourth grade students in applying what she learned in the GLAD training that she recently completed.

Greeting Card Making – Carolyn Mosiman – Vinland Elementary

This project uses “card making” as a vehicle for teaching interpersonal skills, and specifically will be used by the counseling staff at Vinland as they work with counseling support groups and individual students.  The grant provides funds to purchase materials.

Promoting Bilingual Literacy – Laura Lopez – North Kitsap High

Ms Lopez will purchase children’s books written in Spanish for a Spanish class library which will be used to develop vocabulary, grammatical skills, and literacy in students studying Spanish.

Accommodations to Enhance Learning – Susan Longan – Poulsbo Elementary

The first grade teaching team will purchase items such as filters for fluorescent lights, bean bag chairs, exercise music, and others for assessing ways to improve the classroom learning environment.

Wildlife Habitat Project - Lisa Hawkins - Poulsbo Elementary

This project will transform the school courtyard into a certified wildlife habitat by adding specific plants, providing bird seed, and a water source.

2006 Highlights

North Kitsap Education Foundation awarded a total of $3,781 for 11 mini-grants in 2006.  Twenty-three applications were received and evaluated by a committee representing NKEF and the community.

 Rod Puppet Story Tellers – Beverly Godfrey – Vinland, 2nd Grade:  Grant funds will be used to purchase materials for the students to make rod puppets.  The puppets will be used to retell stories from their reading series and also original stories written by the class.

Bringing Museums to Students – Mary Lou Macala – Kingston Jr High, 7th grade History:   Funds help pay for renting and transporting “history kits” from the Burke Museum and the Museum of History and Industry.

Kingston Jr High history student looks at "love beads" and a "peace symbol" necklace from the 60's.  Museum of History and Industry "Portable Museum".  Teacher Michelle Jones tells class about Life Magazine from 1962.

 Book for Night Commuters of Uganda – Ms. Peggy Cook and Dr. De Mackinnon – NKHS – 11th Grade English:  The grant will help pay for books created by NK students which are to be shipped to Uganda for the use of students there who have to commute to safe facilities in towns every night.

 Scope on a Rope – Janet Kragen – Suquamish – 5th & 6th Grade:  The school will purchase a digital microscope that would allow images to be viewed and on a laptop computer or projection screen, and saved on the computer.

 Field Trips to PLU Anatomy Lab and Harborview Hospital – Patti Webster – NKHS – Physiology and Anatomy:  The grant will help pay for field trips to Harborview, where a doctor will give a tour of the emergency room and a slide presentation related to physiology and anatomy, and to Pacific Lutheran University where a professor will instruct the students using cadavers.

 Teens Teaching About Tobacco – Gayl TenEyck – Poulsbo Jr High – 9th Grade English:  A group of Poulsbo Junior High students will be trained at the Kitsap County Health Department to instruct other students about the dangers of tobacco use.  The students will make presentations to 5th grade classes throughout the District.

 Spellography Curriculum – Carla Kessler – Vinland – 6th Grade:  Ms. Kessler has implemented the “Spellography” curriculum to assist students in spelling and vocabulary, and additional materials are needed to expand the successful program to the other 6th graders at Vinland.

 CPR Booklets and Videos – Joan Starr – Poulsbo Jr High – 9th Grade Health Education:  This project will provide the Health Education classes with instructional material on the very latest approved CPR practices, allowing them to become certified.

 Outback Class – Michelle Telles – Kingston Jr High – Special Education:  The grant will provide exercise equipment, videos, and instructional books for a Wellness class provided to “at risk” students.

 Dynamic Seating Tools for Students – Heidi Brislin – Poulsbo Elementary – Occupational Therapist: Poulsbo Elementary will purchase special seat cushions for use by students with Sensory Processing Disorder in order to allow them to improve in-seat behavior and concentration in the classroom.

 Chess Club – Mary Ruth Payne – Pearson Elementary – Librarian:  The highly successful after school chess club will acquire more tournament quality chess sets to better prepare the students for competitions.

Seattle University psychology students meet with Poulsbo Elementary students in a program called "Partnerships in Learning", partially funded by an NKEF mini-grant.

General Information

What is available?  The total annual grant amount available is $4,000, with individual grant amounts averaging $300.

 Who may apply?  Teachers and staff of the North Kitsap School District.

 What to submit?  Original and two copies of the Mini-grant Application.  Applications are available on our

     website and may be photocopied. 

 Where to submit?  North Kitsap Education Foundation, P.O. Box 1236, Kingston, WA  98346

 When to submit?  Applications are normally due by the first Saturday in November.

Review of applications:  The Grants Committee of the North Kitsap Education Foundation reviews all applications.  This committee is comprised of lay people as well as educators so all application information should be clear and concise.  Applicants will be notified by mid-November.

Funding guidelines:  The Foundation must always be ready to explain to its contributors how their money was used to enhance the education of children and where the money was spent.

The intent of the NKEF Mini-Grant Program is to provide funding for innovative, creative learning and administrative opportunities unfunded by other means.  NKEF also recognizes the needs of beginning teachers in establishing their classrooms.  Primary consideration is given to projects that support and enhance education for many students and include active student involvement.

 Proposals are evaluated based on the potential impact on student learning and success, the innovation of the proposal, the creativity demonstrated in the proposal, and whether or not the proposed activity is something that has been funded by the North Kitsap School District in the past.

 Not funded:  Teacher release time, teacher salaries, staff training, capital improvement costs, incentives or rewards and food not related to grant goals.

 NKEF is optimistic that future grants will increase in the number of grants available and the size of the awards.

Previous NKEF Mini-Grant Awards

2005

 North Kitsap Education Foundation awarded a total of $3,000 for eleven mini-grants to North Kitsap teachers and staff.  Grant amounts ranged from $180 to $300.  A grant evaluation committee of NKEF Board and community members evaluated the grant applications and selected the following 11 from over 20 applications.

 Bev Godfrey and Tiff Watland teach first and second graders at Vinland Elementary.  They addressed the “learning to write for a variety of purposes” element of the school’s Learning Improvement Plan by having their students design and then write instructions for building LEGO cars.  The grant money was used to purchase 24 LEGO sets. 

 Pat Bennett-Forman, from Wolfle Elementary, purchased reading books used in a “Bus Bucks for Books” program aimed at improving bus ride behavior and encouraging students to read on the bus.  “Bus Bucks” were given for reading on the bus and appropriate behavior on the bus.

 District Science Coach, Lillian Cone, submitted a proposal for Leslie Maule and Barbara Hall, fourth grade teachers at Breidablik Elementary, to purchase heart rate monitor watches which were used in their combined science and physical fitness program in which the students studied the circulatory system and participated in an exercise program to improve fitness.

 Paula Wood, a special education teacher at Kingston Junior High, used grant funds in her Functional Academics Class to purchase food so the students could learn to plan a menu and cook their own lunch once a month.

 Mark Stebbing purchased flying model airplane kits for Kingston Junior High 7th graders to use in their unit on Principles of Flight.

 Mary Lou Macala used grant funds to purchase operating systems for five surplus Imac computers which her 7th and 8th grade history and English students used to prepare History Day documentaries

 Susan Fritts, Poulsbo Elementary fourth grade teacher, purchased building sets to be used in their unit on simple machines.

 Nicky Seaberg and Barb Emel, Parent Assisted Learning Program (PAL) teachers, used grant funds to help fund an educational field trip to Islandwood School for science presentations.

 Rich Wendt, computer technician at Vinland Elementary, used the grant to help sponsor Vinland’s own “geek squad” of students who dissemble, clean, and reassemble school computers.  The funds were used to buy specialized supplies and tools.

 Laurie Harney, Poulsbo Elementary, used the grant money to help establish a teaching library of storybooks that intentionally and purposefully model the comprehension strategies of inferring, questioning, determining importance, predicting, summarizing, and making connections.  The goal is to compile a collection of seven to ten books for each strategy.

Rene Fossum teaches English and remedial reading at North Kitsap High School and used the grant to purchase computerized quizzes and corresponding novels written in Spanish to be used by English Language Learners (ELL) students and Spanish class students.

2004

North Kitsap Education Foundation awarded five mini-grants in 2004.  While we anticipated awarding only three grants, we received a special donation which allowed us to fund two additional grants. 

The funded grants are:

Colleen Fairchild, "Simple Machines", Vinland Elementary

Marsha Rova, "After School Clubs", Wolfle Elementary

Leah Titze, "Cooking Program",  Kingston Junior. High

Patricia Sheehan, "Partnerships in Learning", Poulsbo Elementary

Rene Fossum, "A/R book Quizzes", North Kitsap High School