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Date: 7/13/2022
NORTHAMPTON – The Northampton Education Foundation (NEF) recently announced that the NEF Endowment Fund, along with its named funds under the NEF Endowment umbrella, has awarded a total of $86,411 to eight projects for the upcoming 2022-23 academic school year.
This year’s total award is the most ever awarded in a single Endowment distribution cycle due to the perpetual generosity of the community, according to Martin Wohl, the vice president of the endowment. The goal of these awards is to fund specific groups and projects that aim to positively impact every child in the Northampton school district.
Out of the $86,411, $15,000 is awarded to district-wide affinity groups to create a more diverse and inclusive workforce; a little over $5,000 is awarded to All Out Adventures to partner with the JFK Middle School and Northampton High School to make cycling accessible to students of all abilities; $5,000 will go toward the Music and Poetry Synchronized program for Northampton High School students to work with art and poetry students from Bulkeley High School in Hartford, CT; $6,642 for the development and implementation of a Plant Science and Food Justice course at the high school; $15,000 for health and wellness components at JFK Middle School; $8,000 for early childhood professional development for Northampton and community preschool teachers; $11,700 for district-wide visual thinking strategies; and $20,000 to expand the partnership between the Hitchcock Center for the Environment and Northampton Public Schools to help build teacher confidence in utilizing outdoor areas for teaching and engagement.
“We’re glad to see it was a broad range of topics,” said Wohl, regarding the list of awards this year. “It gave the school system a good deal of funding for different types of things.”
Background
According to Wohl, the NEF started in 1991 as a way to give small grants to teachers to help enrich and enhance the education experience in Northampton. In 2002, a group of parents came together and developed the idea of an endowment to bring a long-term benefit to the school systems.
Eventually, the endowment group joined NEF to become a conjoined entity, and the organization first distributed award grants in 2007. The endowment is a permanent, self-sustaining, multi-million-dollar fund that will ensure future excellence and innovation in our city schools.
All the funds of the Northampton Education Foundation Endowment Fund are held, invested and managed at the Community Foundation of Western Massachusetts, according to Wohl. NEF, meanwhile, directs all of the NEF Endowments Fund’s awards and distribution. Awards are also currently only distributed to the public schools.
The present and future of the awards
According to Wohl, after multiple million-dollar campaigns – one of which was completed in 2019 – the endowment is now able to distribute more. In its current iteration, the distribution cycle involves putting out a request for proposal for people in the district who want to apply for grants that help enhance the district in some way. After the school district approves people’s proposals, the NEF Distribution Committee evaluates the proposals, and awards the grants.
Wohl added, however, that there are plans to restructure their endowment grants to give the NEF the opportunity to provide even greater annual funding exclusively from the dividends of the Endowment Fund as it continues to appreciate and continues to grow, thanks to community contributions and bequests.
“One thing that can be emphasized in this is the generosity of the community,” said Wohl. “Without that, none of this would have happened.”
Visit the NEF Facebook page to learn more about these awards at https://www.facebook.com/northamptoneducationfoundation.