Education partnerships awarded $4.5 million in grant money

The Georgia Charter Schools Association and a pair of public charter schools were among the winners of $4.5 million in grants announced this week by the Governor’s Office of Student Achievement.

“All three of these grant awards demonstrate the innovative thinking that is coming out of Georgia’s public charter school sector,” said Tony Roberts, president and chief executive officer of the Georgia Charter Schools Association.

The grant money comes from the Innovation Fund, a competitive state award pool set up through the federal Race to the Top program, which was created to encourage schools to come up with new ways to improve student achievement. The state uses the Innovation Fund to reward partnerships between nonprofit organizations, charter schools, school districts, businesses and institutions of higher education.

“The Innovation Fund empowers local communities to work together and think creatively about how to best address their educational needs,” Gov. Nathan Deal said in a press release. “The nine grant awards we make today represent a wide range of projects with the potential to serve as tomorrow’s best practices.”

GCSA will share its $557,151 grant with Lake Oconee Academy, a school the association is working with to expand teacher recruitment and training.

Some of the other grant award winners in metro Atlanta included:

• Drew Charter School in Atlanta, which will share a $749,756 grant with the Georgia Tech Center for Education Integrating Science, Mathematics and Computing, the Georgia State University School of Music and other groups. Drew and its grant partners will work to expand the school's pre-kindergarten science, technology, engineering, arts and math curriculum to grades nine through 12.