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DEL.ICIO.USWilling to spend more for your child’s education?
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
This week Gwinnett County students will be quietly filling in computer form circles while teachers stand by eagerly and watch.
Third, fifth and eighth graders have to take the Iowa Tests of Basic Skills. That’s a whole lot of pressure on the little ones.
How do you make sure your children perform well during these extremely stressful testing times? By giving them as much academic support in and out of the classroom as possible.
Luckily for students in Lawrenceville and Suwanee, a group of parents and concerned citizens cooked up an educational idea that could really grow into a great community initiative.
The Collins Hill Education Foundation (CHEF) has been created to expand and strengthen academics for students attending schools in Gwinnett County’s Collins Hill cluster.
CHEF serves students attending Dyer, McKendree, Rock Springs, Taylor and Walnut Grove elementary schools as well as Creekland Middle and Collins Hill High. They raise money to donate to worthy classroom projects so that students in these schools can gain an educational advantage.
Now serving: extracurricular food for thought.
Last month CHEF began accepting applications for grants that will pay for innovative programs that enrich students’ education.
Teachers in the Collins Hill cluster schools were encouraged to request funding from CHEF. They eagerly responded.
The program will fund specialized academics, extracurricular activities, and fine arts programs. For example, it would pay for special phonics books to hopefully eliminate reading problems.
The grant application process has ended, but CHEF is still accepting donations. If you want to donate, please contact your child’s school.
CHEF would like each parent to give $45 per child.
That’s relatively cheap compared to the cost of a PlayStation new release video game or Barbie’s latest dream house. But academics is a hard sell that’s not supported by million-dollar commercials airing on Nickelodeon and pop-ups on disney.com.
I received a letter from my child’s school asking for a contribution. I think it’s a good idea and I plan to help.
Would you? Do you think most family households spend more money on extracurricular stuff like games and toys and cell phones? Or is an equal amount of money spent on supporting the classroom?
Permalink | Comments (4) | Categories: Jacqueline Bullard
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By Cletus Snow
October 18, 2006 11:39 AM | Link to this
I’m not sure, it would depend several things,what their budget was,how well I thought they had used it, how the money was to be spent,how they intended to account for money spent,I would need more info.
By Deborah Lee
October 19, 2006 7:30 AM | Link to this
Caution: I still remember and it has been 10 years ago a teacher getting a 500 DOLLAR grant in my son’s 4th grade class to plant a butterfly garden. It came with flowers and booklets. Some company made a killing selling these packets to schools everywhere.With much fanfare and flowers and picture taking and signs I remember thinking, O.K. you planted the garden now who will be watering and weeding the garden. Well guess what, the teacher left the school the following year. I am sure that, PLANTED A BEAUTIFLY GARDEN is on her resume. The garden dried up and is probably still a weed patch and I never saw a butterfly.
By katie
October 20, 2006 7:16 AM | Link to this
I would gladly pay more money for my child’s education to go to a school that doesn’t offer sports. Colleges and Universities have huge althetic programs and have to add on tuition charges in order to cover expenses. I would like my money to go to academics and nothing else.
By Robert C
October 30, 2006 8:46 AM | Link to this
8000 dollars per student is not enough to educate them? lets do some quick math. $8000 per student multiplied by 27 students per class = $216,000. Multiply that by 90 classrooms = 1944000.00 for a school (this is a rough average)and they want more? give me a tax break for crying out loud. 6th grade classes are being taught what I learned in the 4th grade and if the student is taught on the 6th grade level they call that advanced placement, sad. Not one more dime from me. It seems what the schools teach today is how to become a sales person as that seems to be the focus of the schools and the PTA.