Over the years, the Coronado Schools Foundation (CSF) has continued to be responsive to the needs of Coronado Unifed teachers and students. During the 2018-19 school year, CSF’s Program Committee chaired by Claudia Gallant, worked closely with Coronado Unifed School District (CUSD) staff, and established a goal of revising existing CSF Program Funding Guidelines for Site Grants. With the goal of streamlining messaging for potential donors and aligning resources in a thoughtful and cohesive manner, staff reviewed existing programs to develop two distinct pathways that provide value added experiences for students grades TK through 12:
- STEM Innovation Pathway, encompassing science, technology, engineering and math opportunities with all campuses using Project Lead the Way curriculum;
- ARTS Innovation Pathway, encompassing both the visual and performing arts opportunities.
Working closely with site administrators and leadership teams, we ensured programs required to nurture the whole child were provided. As an example, with CUSD taking on funding for the Library Tech at Silver Strand, Technology Resource Teachers at all campuses, and Academic Support and Enrichment (ASE) teachers at both Village and Silver Strand, CSF funding now clearly supports the STEM Innovation and ARTS pathways, ensuring every child has access to equitable, appropriate grade level experiences that can be built upon as they progress through our instructional programs.
This also provided the opportunity to take into account current grant funding available to each
campus, like the Department of Defense Education Activity (DoDEA), in order to ensure funding is truly equitable across the campuses. While each campus also has a PTO that provides support, Coronado High School also has funding for Coronado Art Education Foundation and Career Technical Education (CTE) which was factored into the funding.
We value and appreciate Coronado School’s Foundation grants of $797,000 with total funding over $900,000 with funds returned during the school year. Without the generous donors, The Lipp Family Foundation, Vivian Nelson Foundation, and business partners, these programs would simply not be possible. Thank you, CSF supporters!
The Arts Pathway, visual and performing ensures these first graders in Mrs. DeGroat’s 1st grade class at Silver Strand Elementary have opportunities to ‘dream big’ and attend innovative programs like the recent Chalk Walk at Coronado High School, also funded through the CSF Site Program Grant. (Photo by Erica DeGroat)
