The VEP Board is proud to announce the Partnership has awarded Think Big Grants of $6000 each to three innovative teachers. Think Big Grants range over a two-year span. They are collaborative and bring together teachers, community members and students. They cross grade levels and subjects. VEP had 22 applications for three grants. The process involved a written application and an interview. Six of the 22 applicants were interviewed. The three recipients are:
Alex Wulff- DATA Middle School-SPARK VUSD will encourage and facilitate innovative practices throughout VUSD by establishing a student hosted “Makerspace” training and support center for all Ventura Unified teachers.
Petra McCullough- ATLAS Elementary School- “The Story Time Could Tell.” Students will explore the concept that Earth is organized into different systems by solving real-world problems, collecting data, organizing ideas, making predictions, collaborating as a team, and using time-lapse video.
Kristen Pelfrey- Foothill Technology High School- CREATE: Collaborative Responses (using) Electronics Art Technology Entrepreneurship- All 9th graders are CREATors producing individual and collaborative responses to prompts in a classroom makerspace.
Madhu Bajaj, President of the Ventura Education Partnership commented. “while we love our regular VEPGrants program which offer up to $1000 for classroom grants and will continue to offer those once a year, we wanted to do something more to support highly innovative educators. The Think Big Grants gave us the opportunity to invest in transformative projects that are collaborative and impact a large number of students. We look forward to sharing project results in the near future and expanding this new offering over time.”
Many community businesses and organizations support this program through their funding of VEPGrants. Some of them include MJP Technologies, Community Memorial Health System, Aera Energy, Mountains to Beach Marathon, the Rotary Club of Ventura and the Ventura Kiwanis Club. The Ventura Education Partnership connects community resources to support and sustain innovation in education to benefit VUSD students.
The VEPGrant program will be spotlighted at the inaugural “LAUNCH” event on June 20, 2019. This event will be held at the Ventura Masonic Center at 5:30 pm. LAUNCH will celebrate passionate educators who tell their stories of inspired classroom innovation. For more information contact: VenturaEducationPartnership.org .
