SEQUIM — The Sequim Education Foundation’s latest round of teaching grants — totaling $31,575 to 14 educators across the Sequim School District — helps provide funding for science projects, supplies such as headphones and chairs, and fields trips.
Since the grants started in the 2001-02 school year, the foundation has awarded 159 grants worth $148,501.85 — a figure that does not include mini-grants and funds for individual schools.
This year’s grants also received a boost from Community Partners such as the HVK Foundation, King’s Way Foursquare Church, the Rawlins Foundation, Sequim Sunrise Rotary and Soroptimist Club of Sequim. Those interested in Community Partner of Sequim Education Foundation’s teaching grants can contact Katie Gilles at 360-683-2668 or gilles@olypen.com.
This year’s grants include (by school, teacher):
Sequim High School
• Laura Gould, $1,529 — Knowledge Bowl Expansion; encourages wide knowledge of both academic and popular facts for students in ninth through 12th grades.
• Laura Gould, $2,610 — Project Lead the Way Technology; a biomedical science program that includes biology and STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) curriculum.
Helen Haller
• Gwen Rudzinski, $2,000 — Science on Wheels; astronomy lessons for students in kindergarten and first grade.
• Robin Forrest, $1,582 — Point Defiance Zoo Field Trip; transports as many as 130 third-grade students.
Olympic Academy
• Kim Glasser, $303 — Operation Headphones; 24 sets of headphones for testing and daily use for as many as 100 students in first through 12th grades (current equipment fraying).
• Lilli Hardesty, $6,347 — Chairs; provides adequate seating for for as many as 100 students in first through 12th grades (current seating in poor condition).
• Lilli Hardesty, $567 — Future City; a STEM-based engineering project utilizing computer-aided design, mathematics, science as students in sixth through eighth grades research, design, build cities of the future. Funds would purchase dedicated computer.
Greywolf Elementary
• Kim Knudson, $1,291 — Tech Protect; Protect and support Sphero Robot and Kindle Fire Technology currently in use for students in second grade; also to be used for kindergarten through fifth-grade students during Engineering Day; funding made possible by Rawlins Foundation.
• Jennifer Lopez, $3,200 — Greywolf Kids at Hope Week; a one-week event emphasizing opportunities for educational success, goal setting and quality of life for students in kindergarten through fifth grade; funding made possible by King’s Way Foursquare Church.
• Gretta Rich, $ 736 — Read Naturally subscription for 32 second-grade students.
Sequim Options School
• Michelle Mahitka, $5,024 — Technology and equipment; grant replaces old laptops, computer chairs and charging stations for students in 10th through 12th grades.
Sequim Middle School
• Caleb Gentry, $1,386 — Xbox One Controllers; a STEM-based game design program for students in seventh and eighth grades.
Multiple schools
• Linsay Rapelje — Family Reading Night; promotes literacy at all grade levels (last year’s event served 650 students, adults).
• Jorn van de Wege — Lego WeDO 2.0 Kits; the advanced-placement computer science students from Sequim High School mentor elementary students in second through fourth grades to create a pathway for computer science, coding, math and science for students at all grade levels.
