Time to Vote for Our Charitable Projects Choice
Carol Provan and Sandy Holmes
Thank you for your generous support of SLGC’s Charitable Projects. Twenty-two proposals were received by the CP Committee in application for our approximately $12,000 in contributions for funding. Below are summaries of the project proposals that the committee recommends to the membership for our largest grant. Please indicate which you prefer. After member voting, the committee will allocate the remaining funds among the remaining qualified applicants. Members may either vote online up until the membership meeting on April 23 or in person at the meeting.
Stonebrook Montessori School
Stonebrook Montessori School is a tuition-free public charter Montessori school, part of the Cleveland Metropolitan School District, located on Wade Park Boulevard in the Glenville neighborhood. Glenville is a low-income area that is predominantly African-American with over 50% of the population living below the federal poverty line. Now in its fourth year, serving 3-9 year olds, the school will eventually go up to age 15. It has a waiting list, as the immediate alternative is a CMSD school considered to be failing.
Established to have a positive effect in Glenville and to grow to become a neighborhood center, Stonebrook offers parenting classes, social events, parent resources, infant classes, etc.
This project, created in partnership with the Nature Center at Shaker Lakes, establishes an Educator-in-Residence program at Stonebrook for students in Kindergarten through Grade 6. NCSL educators will provide hands-on science lessons using the Cleveland Cultural Gardens, Doan Brook, and the Nature Center in a differentiated curriculum by grade/age.
Complementing the program is the completely transformed landscape around the school, an outdoor teaching and learning environment.
This program is being piloted with 4th-5th graders in the spring of 2019 with funding from Dominion Charitable Foundation and others. Stonebrook is requesting funding to expand the program to preschool and lower elementary students for the 2019-2020 school year. The grant will be used to support the Educator-in-Residence salary, provide program supplies and classroom science materials, and fund field trip transportation. Further, they seek to integrate environmental education enrichment through hands-on science experiences and with raised bed gardening.
Metro Catholic School
Metro Catholic School was established in 1988 as a merger of three inner-city Catholic schools whose declining enrollment and financial fragility threatened their independent existence. As a combined entity, elimination of duplicate administrative expenditures, etc., has allowed the school to effectively serve the needs of the greater Clark-Fulton community, which is probably Cleveland’s most diverse neighborhood. The community has a large and growing Hispanic population, a deeply rooted segment of descendants of the original European residents, and a growing population of African-Americans. Less than 50% of the student body is Catholic.
Metro encompasses a widely diverse school community (race, religion, ethnicity) in an area where household incomes fall below the federal poverty level line. While tuition is low, most students attend through family participation in the Cleveland School Voucher Program.
Recognizing that their students live in a “food desert”, the proposal establishes a year-round Learning Garden to address this. They plan to develop student appreciation for a healthy diet by exposing students, and ultimately their families, to a wide variety of fruits and vegetables and by nurturing trust and responsibility through the process of gardening. The school will partner with The OSU Extension Summer Sprout Program, Cleveland Botanical Garden Master Gardener Program, Cleveland Metroparks, Northeast Ohio Regional Sewer District, Cuyahoga Valley National Park and Drink Local Drink Tap for technical assistance and field trips.
The project addresses gardening, healthy eating, whole food cooking, composting, and recycling, and fosters environmental awareness for personal and planet health. The budget request is for garden materials – plants and supplies — and field trips for students in Grades 2-8.
Members are the source of the funds for Charitable Projects, so it is critically important for your voices to be heard. Please be sure to vote!
Click here to vote.
Click here for list of donors