Past Grants

Baltimore City Health Department

For support of the Baltimore Vision Screening Initiative in Baltimore City public schools. The initiative will revamp the current vision-screening program to screen 95 percent of students in pre-kindergarten, kindergarten, and first grade, and provide follow-up care with medical providers for those who fail the screening. The Bureau of School Health will also recruit and train qualified volunteers to conduct screenings in an effort to reach 95 percent of eighth-grade students.

Baltimore City Health Department

Toward support of the Teen Pregnancy Prevention Initiative. The objectives of the initiative are to create a multi-agency collaboration aimed at improving reproductive health services, to strengthen sex education in City Schools, to promote effective contraceptive methods, and to improve family planning services for teen mothers. The long-term goal of the initiative is to reduce teen births in Baltimore City by 15 percent by 2015.

Baltimore City Public Schools – City Neighbors Charter School

In support of the development of a new charter high school, now serving 180 ninth- and tenth-grade students. Based on the progressive model charter school, the City Neighbors High School features the independent project-based learning and advisory system called PODS (groups of 15 students) that meet and work with a teacher for 90 minutes in their own workspaces. PODS were designed to provide leadership development and mentoring for academic skills and work habits.

Baltimore City Public Schools – National Academic League

For support of the 2011-2012 National Academic League (NAL) in 28 Baltimore City public middle schools, involving up to 675 sixth-, seventh-, and eighth-grade students, in a year-long scholastic extracurricular activity. The NAL games are designed to function as competitive events, with team coaching after school two to three times a week under the guidance of teachers. Interscholastic competitions are held every two weeks. Teams that place first and second go on to compete nationally through video conferencing. The purpose is to bring the visibility and spirit of school rivalry of sports competition to academic competition.

Baltimore City Public Schools – National Academy Foundation High School

For the purchase of 30 NOOK eReaders for the 11th-grade English class, to encourage reading e-books inside and outside of school.