EDEF awards five grants to El Dorado educators

The El Dorado Education Foundation awarded five grants to teachers in the El Dorado School District with the goal of improving students’ education and encouraging teachers to think outside the box when it comes to teaching methods.

Two of the grants, Critical Reading: Breaking Cycles of Illiteracy and It’s Your Journey, are focused on helping high school students with literacy and self expression.

“For me, what we try to focus on when it comes to writing literacy grants is what will expand a student’s background knowledge, what’s going to strengthen them in their literacy skills to help them see literacy as fluid – works through visual, written, auditory – so that they see it in different ways. It’s a life skill,” said Jennifer Murphy, EHS English Coordinator who helped write two of the approved grants for this year.

The Critical Reading: Breaking Cycles of Illiteracy class – a new English elective – is designed for ninth and tenth graders who are reading two grade levels below where they should be. Murphy said a lot of these students have a gap in their educational background. It is set up to target these students and work with them to get back on track by giving them a voice in what they’re learning.

“We didn’t want students to come into this thinking it was some kind of punishment,” Murphy said. “So if we can in treating it as if it was just another English class and reading things that are at grade level then they would be forced into that cycle. The idea is that we pull high interest but works of literary merit, which you can find in young adult novels, and pull them (students) in with those high engagement pieces along with a program that works with them on those foundational reading skills.”

Students were given a survey and allowed to vote on the books they would read over the course of the class. The grant allowed EHS to buy the books students said they were interested in reading. This includes A Long Way Down by Jason Reynolds, Ghost by Jason Reynolds and The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas. The books were bought with a mixture of school funds and the grant.

The course is also designed to help students with organizational skills such as how to talk to teachers when they’re struggling in a class.

“We’re trying to get kids college ready but we’re also trying to get them career ready. For some of our kids that means that we want them to be able to go to vocational school and get a job and have those literacy skills. We want them to be successful in whatever way that looks at the end of the day.”

Meanwhile, the It’s Your Journey class is taught through the visual arts department and has students discover, analyze and write poetry that focuses on challenges, choices and perseverance. The class is focused on helping students connect the challenges in their lives and overcome those challenges by using art.

“One way students will discover that they can overcome challenges will be by mastering the art of printing,” the grant states. “The students will use carving techniques to create linoleum block prints. Their prints will illustrate how they plan to maintain positive momentum in their lives.”

Students will pick a poem they feel connected with and complete an analysis, then use a variety

of different artistic media to explore the feelings in that piece.

“I think kids have a lot of stresses on them and figuring out different ways that they can cope with those stresses and get that anxiety out in a positive way is an important life skill,” Murphy said.

The EDEF gives out grants each fall to teachers in the El Dorado School District. Funding for these grants come from community donations. The EDEF also works throughout the year with teachers on grant proposals and finding funds for other things teachers need.

The grant requests go through a third party review system at Southern Arkansas University in Magnolia. Murphy said part of the process includes looking at how many students can be impacted by the grant and a clear need in the district that the grant addresses.

These grants are in addition to the yearly grants, such as one that supports the Read for the Record program which is focused on elementary students and gets them excited about reading.

“It allows teachers the freedom and the resources to maybe try something new or to expand an idea that maybe they can’t do except on a smaller scale,” Murphy said.

Michael Shine may be reached at 870862-6611 or mshine@ eldoradonews.com. Follow him on Twitter and like him on Facebook @MichaelAZShine for updates on Union County school news.