It only takes a quick skim of our current recipients to see the ideas brought to life by the donors to the FPEF endowment.
Grant requests are made by those who have identified a specific and compelling educational opportunity that only needs funding for implementation.
Fall 2018 Standard Grant Awards
Award Amount: $3,374
The Reflective Learning Project will serve 300+ students each year in grades 9-12 in the Fayetteville HS Fine Arts Department. This project will provide mirrors for students enrolled in band, choir, theatre, color guard, and recreational dance that will allow them to process and apply feedback and instruction with maximum efficiency.
Award Amount: $555
The Washington Elementary Music Enrichment Project will serve 350 students in Kindergarten through Fourth Grade at Washington Elementary, bringing the Arkansas Symphony Orchestra Quapaw Quartet to the school for special demonstrations and hands-on activities. The project will include the "Meet the Strings" and "Mozart: the Storyteller" programs. These programs will provide students with a unique experience to learn from professional musicians and to try their hands on the instruments.
Award Amount: $1,500
The Owl Creek 6th Grade Theatre presents "Willy Wonka, KIDS", will serve over 900 students from PK-6th grades. The project will provide an opportunity for students to become involved in the performing arts, the school, and local communities, and explore a variety of careers in Musical Theatre. The project will foster an appreciation for performing arts and careers, as well as enable students' higher order thinking skills, creativity, communication, and interpersonal and social skills and relationships.
Award Amount: $4,000
Growing Student Robotics for Future Engineers will serve over 100 students every year from the time of funding in perpetuity at the 7th and 8th grade levels at Woodland Jr. High School. The project will provide materials for the greatly growing after school Robotics programs, enabling students to compete at a national level at the US Open and Worlds competitions
Award Amount: $2,000
The STEM FIRST Project will serve 80 students in the 1st grade level at Root Elementary. The project will benefit all students while working together to complete tasks which promote problem-solving, innovative thinking, experimentation, and exploration during math centers. Integrating STEM materials at an early age improves students' abilities to think critically and creatively when approaching new challenges. We want to continue to foster a love of learning and we believe adding STEM materials
Award Amount: $2,500
The Cultivating Learning Through Hydroponics and Aeroponics Project will serve 120 ninth through twelfth grade FHS students. The project will allow students to connect with equipment and concepts used in sustainable plant production through hydroponics and aeroponics. Students will also develop their understanding of the food supply chain through the harvesting, packaging, and marketing of vegetables grown in the systems which will improve their financial literacy, science understanding, and written/verbal communication skills.
Award Amount: $1,050
The Non-Fiction Reads for Reluctant Readers Project will serve 350 students from Kindergarten to the 4th Grade at Washington Elementary School. The project will provide students that are at-risk with non-fiction library books on subjects including space, dinosaurs, weather, science, and math.
Award Amount: $3,000
The Traveling Troupe of Drama Dawgs, represented by Thespian Troupe 717 from Fayetteville High School, are applying to receive aid in the registration and travels to the 2018 State Thespian Festival held in Russellville, Ar. Our troupe of 25 students, grades 10-12, will represent our school on a statewide level to be adjudicated in both performance and technical theatre.
Award Amount: $2,832
The "Creating a Nurturing Nest" project will serve 920 students annually in grades Pre K - 6 at Owl Creek School. The project will provide students an opportunity to take full advantage of our 8 beautiful courtyards enabling them to learn outdoors in a safe area. The courtyards have been underutilized for over a decade. We hope to expand the boundaries of all of our classrooms for students to learn in outdoor settings.
Award Amount: $2,657
Breakfast Club's Aspiring Actors and Artists field trip empowers (60) low-performing at-risk students to travel and experience a professional theatre production of classic stories and learn how narration, props, and character shape mood and tone. Etiquette and life skill coaching prepares participants for professional behavior at performances and sit-down restaurants. Pre-show curriculum builds literacy and reading skills about author's purpose and other abstract English concepts, providing 10 hours of engaging instruction to improve reading scores.
Award Amount: $2,500
"Creating an Exemplary Library at Leverett Elementary School" will serve 310 students, many who are at risk and come from low-income homes, in kindergarten through 4th grade. The project will provide up to 1,000 fiction chapter books and picture books and supplies to create a dynamic, inviting, kid friendly library space filled with books in one of the oldest elementary schools in Fayetteville. A strong school library builds strong students.
Award Amount: $2000
The Getting Kids Outside Through English Curriculum and Experiential Learning program will serve over 90 students in grades 9-12 at ALLPS School of Innovation. The program will give students the opportunity to experience the outdoors by providing necessary materials such as tents, sleeping bags, and backpacks while connecting the experience to their classroom work on a supervised, guided overnight trip. The materials will also be made available to students to use outside of school.
Award Amount: $4,650
Agriculture Power - Technology of the Tractor is a project to serve 180+ students grades 9-12 in our agriculture program at Fayetteville High School. The project will provide a tractor to use as a teaching tool for diesel mechanics and maintenance, power transfer systems, hydraulics, equipment service and repair, and equipment operation. The project will help increase opportunities we have in teaching agriculture power concepts and increase student involvement with diesel mechanics as a career.
Award Amount: $600
AED Trainers for Future Health Care Professionals will serve approximately 180 students in Fayetteville High School. The project will provide students with the most current technology to become, American Heart Association, Basic Life Support Certified. This will enable students to save lives not only in our school but in the community as they train for their future.
Award Amount: $1,500
Sight and Sounds for Students with Special Needs will serve 20 students in the 5th and 6th grade at McNair Middle School. The grant will provide students the access they need to enhance their educational experiences in all sensory related areas. These tools will help them to be better equipped in the general education settings.
Award Amount: $ 3,000
The Leader in Me program is based on Stephen Covey's book, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. The program, for grades kindergarten through 5th (approx. 443 students), produces transformational results, such as higher academic achievement, fewer discipline problems, and increased engagement among teachers and parents. It also equips students with the self-confidence and skills to thrive in the future. Teachers at Asbell Elem were trained in 2016 and has been successful thus far.
Award Amount: $1, 000
The Makerspace Stations for the Library Media Center will serve 302 k-4th grade students at Leverett elementary. The project will provide students with a Makersspace, enabling them to develop problem-solving, exploration, and creativity skills while sharing their work and designs.
Award Amount: $2,646
"Growing Makerspace Minds and Tower Gardens" is a Makerspace STE(A)M project featuring 2 indoor tower gardens to grow produce to learn about agriculture, sustainability, cost, and productivity. This project in McNair Makerspace extends the curriculum in science, math, writing, and technology.
Award Amount: $4,000
The Picture My Future Project will serve 25 students at Ramay Junior High School each year. The project will provide students that are aspiring journalists an opportunity to use state of the art photography equipment in their Journalism class and at Ramay sponsored events. Using this photography equipment will provide them with the experience needed to join a photography or journalism course at Fayetteville High School or to pursue a career in journalism.
Award Amount: $500
Maker Moments: Monthly Maker Projects is an extension of the FPEF funded #Makerspace is Lit project. It will provide all Owl Creek Students consumable materials to allow them a choice to participate in rotating, highly engaging, standards-based STEAM projects.
Award Amount: 1,200
Diversifying our Collection: One Book at a Time will serve approximately 900 students in K-6th grade at Owl Creek School. This project will provide students access to more books with protagonists of color and that cover culturally and ethnically diverse subjects.
Award Amount: $2,639
Photograph Books for Reading will serve 110 kindergarten students at Butterfield Trail Elementary. This project will give our students access to more emergent reading leveled books to help them grow key literacy skills. The books provide our students with actual photographs of kids their age, giving the books a more relate-able feel. The more connections our students can make to books, the better readers they will become. The books will also travel home with them.
Award Amount: $1, 000
"Crossover the Gap" Family Literacy Project engages 1,500 students grades 7-8 at two diverse junior highs in a semester-long reading project to develop: literacy skills, inter-personal (soft) skills, desirable character traits, and family participation. Students read THE CROSSOVER by Kwame Alexander, learn character lessons from THE PLAYBOOK, play KAHOOT reading games, and attend a family literacy event at FHS. The project is a component the Bridging the Gap program funded in part by Tyson.
Award Amount: $2,000
The Raiders of the Lost Arkansas project will serve 240 students in the middle school GT program in the FPS district. This project will provide students with materials and resources that will engage students in activities that offer them a deeper understanding of the science and history of previous cultures in the state of Arkansas and enlarge their awareness of Archaeology as a field of study.
Award Amount: $4,000
"Bringing Projects to Life with 3D Printing" gives students opportunities to learn job skills and potentially complete an industry standard certification in manufacturing technology. This extends their learning beyond basic coursework. Nearly all 700+ students at Ramay Junior High in grades 7 and 8 will have the chance to use the extensive 3D printing capabilities this grant will provide. This project engages STEM students in state of the art modeling and production of 3D parts.
Award Amount: $1,300
Diverse Abilities Day is a chance to expose over 600 students, through hands-on experiences, to what life is like for students with physical impairments or learning disabilities. Through this program, we hope to bring compassion, acceptance, and understanding to all. We hope to build an environment for students to ask questions and learn ways to include all students.
Award Amount: $1.685
The Next Generation Science Standards Student-Driven Inquiry Lab Experience will serve 100 anatomy and physiology students in grades 11 and 12 at Fayetteville High School. The project will provide lab materials that will allow students to build models, design and conduct authentic experiments, analyze data, and design solutions to real-world problems.
Fall 2018 Pendergraft Grant Awards
Award Amount: $10,000
Real-World Student-led Investigations Using Authentic Scientific Instruments Project will serve 900 9th and 10th grade Biology students in Fayetteville High School. Students will be provided with authentic data collection instruments throughout the school year to record changes in abiotic and biotic parameters within aquatic environments, culminating in a digital project that will be shared with the public which recommends solutions to human impact issues mandated in Arkansas Next Generation Science Standards.
Award Amount: $9,000
Science in the Ozarks is designed to serve 880 5th grade students from Holt, McNair, and Owl Creek Middle Schools. Based at The Ozark Natural Science Center, students participate in 12 hours of hands-on, inquiry-based, environmental science classes. Using observation, scientific method, and experimentation, students are able to apply and model natural science data and to better understand the ecological systems and natural history of the Ozark ecoregion.