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Date: 4/5/2022
NORTHAMPTON – On April 13, the Northampton Education Foundation (NEF) will conduct their first ever Virtual Trivia Bee to help raise money for “innovative” projects at Northampton Public Schools.
According to Megan Rubiner Zinn, an NEF board member and one of the organizers for the trivia bee, the NEF usually spearheads a spelling bee every year as their biggest annual community event. Due to COVID-19, however, the foundation had to cancel the in-person event over the past two years.
“That’s usually one of our biggest fundraisers for our small grants for teachers program,” said Rubiner Zinn. After finding difficulty with conducting the spelling bee online, the NEF decided it was best to instead develop a virtual trivia bee.
The NEF found inspiration for a virtual trivia bee after seeing that the Amherst Education Foundation was successfully able to conduct an online trivia bee over the past couple of years. “We thought that this seems like a good alternative,” said Rubiner Zinn.
Much like the past spelling bees, the Virtual Trivia Bee will raise money for the small grants for teachers program, which encourages the development of innovative and creative teaching and learning initiatives for Northampton Public Schools consistent with the district’s goals. Through this grant program, the NEF supports the preparation of new instructional materials, methods, and innovative teaching programs that are introduced in a classroom. NEF participates in this program twice a year, and the money from this particular event will fund the fall grant program.
The NEF hired a company hired the Trivia Brothers, a service near Boston, to host the event, which Rubiner Zinn said will be over Zoom. The cost to participate will be $25 per team, and people have the option of playing solo, as well. Rubiner Zinn said that the NEF generally recommends teams of one to six.
Prizes will be offered during the event, including gift cards to A2Z Science and Learning Toy Store, as well as honey to keep within the “bee” theme. Other prizes will be finalized before the trivia bee, as well.
The NEF is primarily raising funds from sponsors who are contributing $250 per question, and those sponsors get a promotion out of that in return.
“Northampton Education Foundation has a lot of goodwill in the community,” said Rubiner Zinn. “It’s been very delightful to see, when we put out the call, that people who sponsored the [spelling] bee in the past and others have immediately said, ‘oh yeah, sure, we’ll contribute.’ It’s been very lovely.”
Although the regularly scheduled spelling bee has not occurred in two years due to the pandemic, Rubiner Zinn told Reminder Publishing that people should expect it to be back in the near future.
“We do hope the spelling bee will come back in-person in the future,” added Rubiner Zinn. “We’re hoping to be able to have it in the fall.”
To register for the trivia bee, people can visit https://northamptoneducation.org/triviabee/. There is no cutoff date to sign up as long as people do so before April 13.