Schools
Prospect Sierra Teacher Wins $10K National 'Teach-Off' Grant
Prospect Sierra School teacher Madeleine Rogin is a national winner of the $10,000 grant in the online-voting Great American Teach-Off contest. She'll use the prize with her classes to restore local habitat and partner with a school in Ghana.
Prospect Sierra's elementary school in El Cerrito erupted in loud applause, cheers and squeals of delight Thursday afternoon when kindergarten teacher Madeleine Rogin received a surprise announcement during a school assembly.
Rogin learned that she is the national K-6 winner of a $10,000 grant from the Great American Teach-Off, an online-voting contest in which votes are cast for the proposals from teachers.
Her proposed project for the grant has two main parts: to help the school's kindergarten teachers work with students to restore habitat at nearby Canyon Trail Park and other areas, and to partner with an elementary school in Ghana. Prospect Sierra would help provide supplies and equipment to the African school, and the El Cerrito students would communicate via Skype with their African counterparts.
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She described her project in a short nomimation video.
Two teachers win the grants, one for grades K-6 and one for grades 7-12. Thousands of teachers from across America were nominated, according to the contest's co-sponsors, the organization GOOD and the University of Phoenix. GOOD describes itself as "a global community of, by, and for pragmatic idealists working towards individual and collective progress."
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"Madeleine is being honored for her peaceful changemaker curriculum, developed with the kindergarten teaching team and in conjunction with 8th grade teachers to teach students about the concepts of courage and empathy and their place in promoting human rights," Prospect Sierra said in an announcement posted on its website Thursday afternoon.
"Madeleine uses these big ideas to talk about race in her kindergarten classroom, introducing the peaceful social change brought about by such leaders as Martin Luther King, Jr.—inspiring her students to become changemakers, too."
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