Classroom Grants
Classroom Grants for up to $1000 Offered to School District 23 educators
Polson Scholarship and Education Foundation (formerly known as Polson Dollars for Scholars), has as one of our objectives “to provide support for School District 23 faculty, staff, and schools, to promote, sponsor, and carry out educational objectives with School District 23 on a fair and nondiscriminatory basis.” As a result of this objective we have received a director-advised grant to be used for Polson teachers to enhance the educational experience.
Our foundation is offering Classroom Grants for up to $1000 to Polson School District 23 educators. The purposes of these grants are wide ranging, should have direct impact on student enrichment and learning above and beyond the normal classroom curriculum. At least one grant a month during the school year will be offered. Applications for the grants will be made on line and are due the first day of the month. Grants winners will be determined by PSEF and will be notified as soon as possible. Money will be available from PSEF to the grantee through the district office. Grantees will attend a school board meeting to accept recognition for their grant award. Reports/proof discussing the use of the grant should be made to PSEF as soon as possible. PSEF plans to use these reports for possible public relations to engender further grant money.
PSEF grant requirements are easy:
- Complete the Application below
- Use the grant for students
- Send PSEF a report or offer proof of grant money use to polsongrants@gmail.com.
Polson Scholarship & Education Foundation
Classroom Grants Awarded 2018 – 2019 school year
#1 Linderman School Store
Students affected: 350 – all of the school grades 2-4
Teacher Kris Nordberg – Lindeman MTSS Committee (Mulit-Tiered Support Systems) $500
The MTTS committee is trying to impact the behavior side of school by rewarding students for good behavior. Linderman Staff currently rewards students with a “purple Pirate Ticket” which can be entered into a weekly drawing for a small prize. Currently 34 students receive a small prize weekly. (Two from each classroom.) The committee would like to expand on the Pirate Ticket idea by allowing students to save up their Pirate Tickets and purchase things from a store; rather than entering into a drawing. This way, every student will get a tangible prize and if students desire to save up for bigger items, they are welcome to do so. This will impact school wide behavior and allow the students who are consistently doing the right thing to be rewarded more frequently.
The money will be spent to stock up Linderman store. We are in need of mostly small items (pencils, stickers, Play-Doh, pencil toppers etc.) but will also need some larger items for those students who wish to accumulate tickets. (The larger items will be small Lego sets, coloring books, board games etc.) We also have quite a few “prizes” that do not cost money like Eat Lunch With Your Teacher and Be First In Line to Lunch.
#2 Logic, Strategy, & Coding Games
Students affected: 48 – Cherry Valley, Linderman and PMS Gifted and Talented Teacher Tamara Fisher – K-12 District GT $500
These items provide an enriching opportunity for our district’s advanced thinkers to stretch and strengthen their logic, strategy, and problem solving skills. These learners are often accustomed to “getting it” right away in the classroom; therefore, these activities are great at helping them learn how to stay with a challenging task, be persistent, and ask for help (something they often don’t have to do in the regular classroom). These items will be used over multiple years and will therefore benefit far more than just the 48 students that will benefit from them this year. They will be used with our gifted students in three schools (CV, Lind, MS).
#3 Getting Out of Dodge….
A Trip to the Museum of the Rockies and Lewis and Clark Caverns
28 5th grade students from Polson Middle School
Teacher Jonathan Gustafson $1000
This trip is definitely beyond the normal classroom! It will give students an experience outside of Polson that directly ties to what they are learning in the classroom. Students will be learning about Lewis and Clark in upcoming Social Studies unit and are currently learning about native peoples in American and Montana. The museum has an exhibit that directly ties to both of these units. The caverns are a real life example of places the expedition visited. Students have also learned about Earth’s place in the universe and the Planetarium show will discuss the universe. Understanding the past and that dinosaurs are a part of our past is a part of the Science curriculum and the Museum has an amazing exhibit.
**This is an experimental trip with my class. Our hope is to get the entire fifth grade to make this trip next year and the years to follow. If all goes well, this trip will not only impact my 28 students this year, but could potentially impact the education of 1000s of students in the future. I am trying to get this grant to offset some of the bus and admission costs, so our families and district do not have to take out of their pockets. The museum is already contributing to some of the busing costs which will surpass the total amount of the grant.
#4 Learning from Light
Grades 9-12 Science, 230 students
Teachers Michael Sitter, Jon Petersen, Kyle Dunn $910
Whether learning about stars, exoplanets, planet atmospheres, searching for life on other planets or studying black holes in Astronomy, scientists will use the spectra given off by these objects. When students are learning about the concept of spectra, nothing would make this more tangible then actually seeing and identifying spectra using this equipment. It deepens and enriches their understanding of how spectra are the “fingerprints” of elements and the most important knowledge we can gather on these space objects. The same benefits can be echoed in chemistry and physics when studying elements and the properties of light. Students get to see the differences in elemental spectra rather than just hear them explained.
The following items will be used in all 7 sections of Earth Science on a yearly basis (every freshman at PHS) and in the chemistry and physics classes (juniors and seniors). The “spectrum tube system” is reusable every year and the “spectrum tubes” last several years but eventually need to be replaced. The cost of the spectrum tubes are much lower than the “spectrum tube system.”
#5 Advisory Activity Grant
425 Polson Middle School students
Guidance Counselor Rhonda Hinman
$1000
Polson Middle School has been piloting an advisory program where students in sixth through eighth grade meet in small groups with an advisory teacher (staff from PMS) to develop relationships so that students feel a connectedness with a caring school adult, as well as with their peers. Advisory classes are pertinent to the growth of a middle school student reports Carnegie Council on Adolescent Development and helps students improve academically. Since middle school years can be a time of great change for students, building relationships is essential to the success of a middle school student. Students will feel a sense of belonging and trust. Through activities in the Advisory classes, students will get to know each other better and develop bonds. Team spirit will occur due to having a common purpose. Tolerance and unified decision making may also occur. When students work together for a common purpose, growth and morale will increase.
Polson Middle School would like to foster this sense of belonging and team spirit with quarterly advisory team activities including: Human Foosball, Duck Boat Dynasty, Snow Snakes, Fear Factor and/or Volleysquare competitions. PMS needs funding to make these competitions a success. Quarter one involves building a lifesize Human Foosball game board where students are the foosball players connected to the poles. The purpose of quarter two’s Duck Boat Dynasty is a team-building STEM engineering activity where students collaborate, problem solve, and develop a sense of team spirit and community in creating a cardboard boat using only duct tape, cardboard, glue, spray paint, and markers. In quarter three, students would build and design their own wooden snow snake to battle in the traditional winter Native American sport played by many tribes in the northern Midwest, where students throw wooden sticks that are painted to look like snakes down a snow course. Quarter four’s funds would be used to make a student version of Fear Factor and/or Volleysquare. In a Fear Factor student competion, two members of each advisory team would play one Fear Factor event, like eating a banana through a screen or eating cat food (really chicken). There would be several events so all team members would have an opportunity to represent their team. Volleysquare is a version of the game four square played in the air with a PVC pipe frame and a ball. All of these advisory team activities will help develop relationships among students and staff to build a connection to Polson Middle School.
The materials will be used over time as long as they hold up. Most items can be purchased at a local hardware store and online from “Buckets of Fun.” Please note that the activities may change due to unforeseen reasons. Currently, staff is spending their own money for incentives and rewards for their Advisory class. Hopefully, some of this grant may be used for incentives and rewards.
Through videos, pictures and invitations to attend the activities and challenges, we will demonstrate that the grant is being used as planned. Thanks to Tami Morrison, Polson Middle School did a Duck Boat Dynasty in 2018-2019 and it was a huge success! We have pictures and videos of this awesome activity.
#6 Project Wet / Watershed
3rd Grade Linderman – 115 students
Teacher Darcie Laud $1000
The third grade studies the watershed system with area lakes, rivers, and creeks. We have field trips that help our students understand more about our area watershed, but the students do not get the opportunity to net the bugs and aquatic insects that play a natural part of our water system. These readers and aquatic tools would enhance our resources with hands on opportunities for students to do their own water sampling, aquatic insect handling, identification, and return, as well as learn how to use resources that will hopefully later become an important part of their lives in the outdoors. The items we are requesting are not consumables so we would be able to use them from year to year.
Each third grade teacher and will be responsible for displaying information learned, resources being used, and a 3D project displaying our local watershed system.
We would need the grant money no later than May 15th.
#7 Social Media Marketing Program
50 students High School Business Teacher Casey Donahue $1000
This social media marketing simulation is a hands on experience for students that we wouldn’t be able to otherwise provide. They get to use social media for professional purposes without their personal accounts or information being exposed. The number of students effected could potentially be much greater than 50, but that is roughly the number of students who have been through the marketing classes offered just this year.
Student social media marketing program that includes updated resources each year as well as an online simulation for social media marketing. The program cost is $2,000 each year, and we have received a $1,000 grant towards the purchase already. If we can get the funds towards this for the first year, we hope to increase interest in the Marketing program and our new marketing club DECA. With increased participation in DECA we would try to fund the program for future years through our store and fundraising efforts.
The best way to demonstrate the use of this grant is through the students’ use of social media for professional purposes. We hope to develop an online presence for DECA that promotes our club and our school as a whole in a professional manner. This would include creating new, supervised, accounts on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Snapchat. Social media is in everything students do so educating them to use it for good will help prepare them for a workforce that requires a higher level of comfortability and competency in social media than ever before.
# 8 Monster Mobcast
Polson Middle School grades 6-8 — 550 students
Teacher Tami Morrison $1000
Monster Mobcast will be a news podcasting and video blogging (vlog) gateway for students at Polson Middle School. Did you know that “50% of all homes are podcast fans,” according to Podcast Insights online and the Edison Research Infinite Dial 2019 and that “children between the ages of seven and 13 respond more creatively to radio stories than to stories shown on television” reports The Atlantic online?
Monster Mobcast would provide opportunities for students to create their own podcast or vlogs posted on PMS’s website. Students could produce a variety of podcasts/vlog formats including: interviews, conversations, video demonstrations, nonfiction and fiction storytelling within a diverse selection of genres like comedy, mysteries, news documentaries, history, radio theater, sports, etc. depending on student interests. Monster Mobcast would become a part of the Media Mania class where students produce PNN (Pirate News Network) and The Hook (the school newspaper). In addition, other students/classes could submit podcasts/vlogs to be aired on the Monster Mobcast station, like ELA classes could publish their fiction pieces or science classes could create science demonstrations. Students could take live phone calls via the Bluetooth capabilities of the podcast studio from community members or even experts from out of town. Monster Mobcast would improve student listening skills and enhance learning by encouraging students to develop their own podcasts/vlogs with topics that they are interested in.
The RODECaster Pro Podcast Studio is a new technology that is all in one podcasting setup including a mixer and sound player. It would allow students to take live calls with Bluetooth capabilities, include up to 4 participants in a podcast scenario, add sound effects, music, and jingles to any podcast. All podcasts are saved to a microdisk right in the podcast studio saving lots of editing time. Check out the video on https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1466065-REG/rode_rodecaster_pro_4_person_podcast.html to view the full capabilities of this new technology.
Monster Mobcast’s podcasts/vlogs will be posted on the PNN Live Streaming link on Polson Middle School’s website. Webisodes aired will be linked to the website giving students, parents, and the community the opportunity to check out what students are producing.