The District 300 Foundation for Educational Excellence Grant Winners Begin Their Summer Workshops

The Foundation has funded two exciting educational programs beginning this summer, one being an Innovation Grant program titled Summer Brain Stimulus authored by Michelle Soland, a Westfield Elementary Educator, and the other being a Large Project Grant titled Healthy Living and Learning Camp authored by Francesca DiMaggio, a Jacobs High School Assistant Principal and the students that make up the Service-Learning Action Plan (SLAP) group.

The Summer Brain Stimulus program will run for six weeks at Westfield Elementary School and will work with students in third, fourth and fifth grades. During the two hours of instruction, each student will be doing physical exercises designed to make the brain more receptive to learning, while using games and software designed to improve their auditory, visual and sequential memory. The focus areas, for each student will be: reading fluency, comprehension, critical thinking, word building and literacy devices. Instruction will also focus on memory activities in Math to increase mental ability and computation skills.

For the first time in District 300, students from all three high schools will be offered the opportunity to join together to form a coalition dedicated to closing the achievement gap in the Healthy Living and Learning Camp. These high school students will form and enact a Service-Learning Action Plan (SLAP) within the community. This plan will target 1st and 2nd graders in each of D300’s Elementary Schools in order to enrich children at a young age on the effectiveness of service learning. This program is aimed at improving attendance and grade level academics, and will run approximately four hours a day for two weeks at three of the elementary schools in District 300, at no charge to the students.

 The District 300 Foundation for Educational Excellence is a 501(c)3, non-profit organization, committed to enhancing and extending learning opportunities in all D300 schools through school, community and business partnerships.  Since the D300 Foundation was founded in 2002, it has awarded nearly one half million dollars in local educational project grants – all made possible by private donations and special fundraisers.

We invite you to view our website at www.d300foundation.org and view some of the projects the D300 Foundation has funded.