A number of schools have developed projects with support from the Foundation that clearly deserve a wide audience. In different and significant ways these projects are innovative and contain elements that might be reproduced by others. Even if they are not immediately relevant in that way, they seem to us to offer experiences from which others can learn. The schools are listed alphabetically with brief descriptions of their projects and what is available on the school website, which you can reach directly from here by simply clicking on the name of the School. Following the list of schools is a list of Associations that have also received Foundation support for projects which they are willing to share beyond their own membership. As with the schools, to reach the Association website, just click on the name of the Association.
Buckingham Brown & Nichols School Cambridge, MA
www.bbns.org/campaign.htm
Buckingham Brown & Nichols School was awarded a $50,000 grant in November 2005 to assess and analyze a possible achievement gap between African-American, European-American and Asian-American students. Recognizing that there exists a perception a gap exists between the achievement of BB&N African-American and European-American students, the school seeks to understand the origins of that perception and, as appropriate, to address the underlying cause of such a gap. The research involves undertaking an examination of the educational experiences of African-American students during their tenure at BB&N and generating follow-up activities either to close the gap or to address the perception of the gap.
Chestnut Hill Academy, Philadelphia, PA
Character education for adolescent boys has become increasingly challenging. Chestnut Hill Academy was awarded a grant in April 2004 for its proposal to develop a “Best Practices” Upper School Boys Character Education Curriculum in concert with a research protocol from the University of Pennsylvania’s Graduate School of Education. The goal of the research seeks to find naturally occurring venues within the high school curriculum for building a strong sense of values – honesty, courage, sportsmanship, loyalty and integrity – in a fashion effective for teenagers, to develop systematic approaches to this work based on research based best practices and to test its impact in a controlled, scientific fashion.
Garrison Forest School
Funded through a grant in April 2004, the Garrison Forest School “Women in Science & Engineering (W.I.S.E.)" Program was developed as a joint initiative with Johns Hopkins University in response to the critical shortage of American women working in science, engineering and technology. The W.I.S.E. pilot program is designed to dramatically increase the scientific literacy of Garrison Forest School students by providing interactive, one-to-one mentoring opportunities with female scientists who are on the leading edge in their fields. The objectives of the W.I.S.E. program includes matching promising science students with female Hopkins scientists to serve as mentors, student research projects, a JHU guest lecturer series, GFS faculty and curriculum development with Hopkins faculty assistance, stipends for faculty and W.I.S.E. –specific equipment funding, and meeting JHU research grant funding outreach standards.
Germantown Friends School, Philadelphia, PA
The November 2004 grant awarded to Germantown Friends School supported a Diversity / Curriculum Sharing biology research project with students from Girard College, a K-12 boarding school serving single parent children with limited means, in cooperation with the department of biochemistry at Temple University. The project engages students in authentic, collaborative research with peers from diverse backgrounds and exposes them to people and resources of Germantown Friends School, Girard College and Temple University while exploring evolution by examining variable and conserved regions of specific genes across species and using the internet as their laboratory.
Hackley School Tarrytown, NY
Hackley School received a grant in November 2003 to support “The Fellows Program.” The purpose of the program is to enable recruitment of minority faculty in what is a very competitive hiring environment. Modeled after corporate recruitment programs that approach candidates while they are juniors and seniors in college, “The Fellows Program” seeks to expose talented young people of color to the teaching profession in independent schools, and by doing so, provide a more diverse learning environment for Hackley students. The candidates are offered substantial educational stipends in exchange for completing a two-year teaching commitment after graduating from college. This is new thinking about the recruitment issues faced by the vast majority of independent schools, and may provide a successful model for other schools to follow. For more information on this project contact project supervisor Natalie Herring at the Hackley School, who can be reached at nherring@hackleyschool.org or 914.366.2665.
The Holderness School, Plymouth, NH
The Holderness School was awarded a $50,000 grant in November 2005 to help create a year-long signature senior intellectual experience at Holderness, defined by an integrated seminar-based course followed by an individually crafted “Thesis” that allows a student to explore an area of intellectual passion. The program consists of a series of lectures and discussion groups intended to expose students to college-level instruction, and a senior thesis term when students would formulate independent proposals, drawing on the interdisciplinary experience of the senior seminar. The program would culminate at the end of the year with each student’s submission of a well-crafted paper and presentation of his or her work to the greater community.
The Kinkaid School, Houston, TX
Development of a Character Education Program was the focus of a $50,000 grant to The Kinkaid School in June 2002. The matching grant provided seed money for development of the program during the first three years of the new program director’s service. The Character Education Program is designed to instill in students core values of honesty, responsibility, respect and kindness with explicit and implicit instruction. The initiative was viewed as being critically important to the school at all levels.
Lancaster Country Day School, Lancaster, PA
An academic supplemental financial aid endowment was initiated by an April 2005 grant to the Lancaster Country Day School to provide financial support for the school’s participation in The Hague International Model United Nations Program. The Model United Nations program is a senior-year elective that challenges students to look at the complexities of the world in new ways. Students undertake a special research project on various countries and learn to write resolutions of the kind used in the real UN on various topics like human rights, global climate change and weapons of mass destruction. In January, the LCDS students fly to The Hague to participate in the International Model United Nations. The program also includes trips to New York and Washington, DC. LCDS is one of only six schools from the United States to attend the Hague event with students from approximately 140 other countries
Laurel School, Cleveland, OH
In June of 2003 Laurel School received a grant to create a “Scholar in Residence Program” that will bring one nationally-recognized specialist in the areas of arts, humanities or sciences to the campus for a two-week residency each year. The goals of the program are to provide an opportunity for Upper School students to work in interdisciplinary activities with working professionals and to provide professional development opportunities for Laurel teachers and teachers from other schools in Northeast Ohio. The program will also provide the visiting scholars a retreat space for reflection and close observation of the environment. Recent recipients of the “Scholar in Resident” grant are poet and essayist Dr. Barbara Hurd (2005) and environmental artist Jane Ingram Allen (2006).
The Lawrenceville School, Lawrenceville, NJ
Lawrenceville School’s “Green Campus Initiatives” was awarded a $50,000 grant in June 2005. The school sought to carry forward an initiative it had started to bring an environmentally active approach to all the School’s buildings and activities by deepening partnerships with the local community and other independent schools. The three components of the project are “Greening Lawrence” Community Task Force in support of Sarah James’ natural step community workshops; “Regional Land and Water Management Plan” to extend the Andropogon campus land and water management plan to the region; and “Leadership Forum on Sustainability,” a year-long faculty / student/ staff/ community study and action group.
Montgomery Bell Academy, Nashville, TN
The Foundation awarded a $100,000 grant to Montgomery Bell Academy in April 2005 to support development of an observatory at Long Mountain, a pristine location in rural Tennessee. The observatory project includes expansion of MBA’s curriculum and developing an astronomy collaboration with Harpeth Hall School, Vanderbilt University and two inner city programs – Time to Rise and Backfield in Motion. An observatory at Long Mountain will provide faculty and students an opportunity to conduct real astronomical research including participation in the Supernova Search Program and other timely, relevant programs. The ability to control the telescope remotely through the Internet will allow MBA to incorporate the astronomical research into classroom and homework setting, making it a year-long integrated program that significantly enhances the school’s science curriculum.
St. Anne’s-Belfield School, Charlottesville, VA
Transition from high school to college was the focus of a $50,000 November 2005 given to St. Anne’s-Belfield school. The purpose was to establish a required seminar/research curriculum for seniors and to sponsor a national conference to engage the provosts of major colleges and universities in a discussion of the transition from high school to college. The curriculum will come from a variety of sources and will be designed to encourage students’ reflection on four issues: their privileged status as members of private schools, their role as citizens, their religious questionings, and their roles as future spouses and parents. In the second semester, students will work on individual research projects with a member of the faculty either at St. Anne’s-Belfield School or the University of Virginia. The program also includes guest speakers and a symposium for parents of seniors.
Vermont Academy, Saxtons River, VT
Vermont Academy received $50,000 in April 2006 to provide initial funding for the Vermont Environs Program, a “place-based” initiative intended to expand the academic and extracurricular components at Vermont Academy. The program focuses on providing students with real-world learning experiences by immersing them in the unique Vermont environment through participation in campus and community sustainability initiatives, in community service learning projects, and by involving the Vermont Academy participants in mentoring and teaching Saxtons River Elementary and Montessori students about sustainable practices and their local community. The ultimate goal is the development of a sense of place and stewardship the students can take with them anywhere. The program could be used as a model for other schools in the region, especially schools in small towns where collaboration between community entities is easily facilitated.
Westminster School, Simsbury, CT
Westminster School faculty participation in the Crossroads Cooperative Learning Program (CCLP) involving students from Hartford Public High School was supported in November 2004 through a grant from the Edward. E. Ford Foundation by underwriting compensation of participating Westminster faculty for a three-year period. The Crossroads program seeks to track and advocate for students from their sophomore year to their graduation from Hartford Public High School. It is viewed as a unique professional development opportunity for the faculty of Westminster School which looks to expand its participation in the Crossroads program.
Winchester-Thurston, Pittsburgh, PA
“The City As Our Campus” project of Winchester-Thurston School was the recipient of a November 2004 grant from the EEFord Foundation. The City As Our Campus links curriculum and students to the rich educational and cultural resources of the city of Pittsburgh. Specifically, the grant funds the services of a consultant who can serve as a liaison with City resources, is knowledgeable about curriculum, and can act as a catalyst to form bonds between the School and community. Students will participate directly in issues and projects in the community, and have opportunities to apply their foundational classroom learning to real-world situations.
