From sensory gardens to student-constructed ferris wheels, Berkeley County School District teachers have some innovative projects in the works.
Thirty educators/employees from 15 BCSD schools were able to secure funding – either individually or as a team – through Berkeley Electric Cooperative’s 2023 Bright Ideas Education Program.
The program supports innovative and effective classroom education curriculum that cannot be covered by traditional school financing. Individual teachers can apply for grants up to $1,000 while teams of teachers are eligible for grants up to $1,500.
Teachers in public and private schools, K-12 in Berkeley Electric Cooperative’s service area are eligible to participate. Grants are awarded for projects in any discipline and are intended to help teachers within Berkeley Electric Cooperative’s service area produce a better-educated workforce. The grants are designed to help teachers introduce innovative teaching methods.
Grants are awarded annually in a competitive evaluation process. This year, with the support of the community, Berkeley Electric was able to distribute more than $35,000 to 30 different educational projects across the Lowcountry, supporting teachers and their classrooms.
Congratulations to two Sangaree Elementary educators on winning a Bright Ideas Grant!
School librarian Dawn Frazier and computer lab assistant Kim Weldon joined forces to get funds for a project featuring Novel Engineering, a teaching method to make tie-in connections to a picture book by evaluating problems faced by characters in the story and collaboratively creating inventive solutions with 3-D, open-ended magnetic shape kits called Magformers. This will help expand the school’s Makerspace classroom opportunities, in addition to enhancing their instruction time in the library.
“Our kiddos are going to love working with Magformer Kits,” Frazier said.