2018 Recipients

2018 Recipients

In 2018, the Technology Education Foundation (TEF) awarded grants to deserving recipients throughout Southern Wisconsin. Each recipient demonstrated their ability to provide science and/or technology for the greater good of our community. Congratulations to:

Catholic Multicultural Center: $7,200 for technology to Culinary Creations Catering Job-Training Enterprise. Catholic Multicultural Center formed Culinary Creations (CCC) Catering social enterprise to offer individuals facing barriers to employment meaningful, paid on-the-job training in foodservices as well as professional and personal development opportunities. In order for trainees to effectively overcome their barriers to employment, they will need to learn basic computer and technology skills, be comfortable using technology for job-searching, and by offering personal and professional development opportunities.  With laptops trainees will learn how to write a resume, use online job-search sites, and communicate with potential employers.

DANEnet: $7,300 to continue and expand Everyone On Madison into other communities in Dane County. Funds will help low-income household to enroll in affordable internet access programs, purchase low-cost computers and gain digital literacy skills. When people get the tools, skills, and support to fully utilize society, they are more likely to have increased access to educational resources, employment opportunities, social network, health information, financial and banking services, leisure pursuits and civic participation. The TEF grant will help DANEnet staff coordinate the project, teach digital literacy workshops in English and Spanish, provide Fix IT clinics and deploy devices.

Door Creek Church: $9,930 to start a new STEM after-school classroom. The objective of the program is to connect disadvantaged students, those with little or no exposure to STEM, with mentors within the community to plant the seeds of both future academic and career success in the fields of science and technology. This program will initially target low-income 6th-8th grade students, operating two days a week. TEF funds will provide the classroom with iPads and laptops.

Edgewood College: $4,901 to support the Office of Science Outreach for the technology education features of its programs. The Office of Science Outreach works with schools and community centers around Madison to support children in navigating success in STEM activities, including afterschool and summer programs. For technology education, the Office of Science Outreach has sets of peripherals and programs such as Sphero robots, littleBits electronic building blocks, LightBot coding puzzle, and other tools to help increase interests in computer programming and give children and families the kinds of early experiences necessary for success.

Goodman Community Center: $11,512 for the creation of Change Makers Club. Change Makers Club is an experiential, challenge-based education process where youth use creativity to develop a product idea and then learn the tools and technology to make their ideas a reality. This program is where youth will develop creative confidence, study habits and leadership skills through researching, designing, building and iterating solutions to problems.  Goodman Community Center will expose, educate and train future computer scientists, engineers, and leaders of our community through makers clubs and technology literacy.

Monroe High School: $10,056.35 for the creation of studio space for all staff and students to use in creating content not only for their coursework but also for the community. This space would be dedicated to students to work on projects including filming, recording audio, and photo and video editing. By providing greater access to the creative tools for digital media content creation, students will have the opportunity to develop in-demand skills that have become increasingly important for every size and type of business in cultivating social media presence and consumer brand engagement.

St. James School: $10,000 to complete implementation of their information technology plan to provide grades 4 through 8 with Chromebooks so that all students have a classroom set of computers in order to enhance their learning opportunities. The funds will replace outdated computers with new ones for teachers to work in sync with students. Teachers will be able to interact more consistently and productively with their students because their new computers will be compatible in software applications. All 4th through 8th grade students will have one-on-one computer availability and with increased access-point wiring, the internet will be reliable, vibrant, robust, and consistent for all staff and students and St. James School.

The First Tee: $5,000 for iPads to be used at the 3rd Learning Center at Nine Springs Golf Course. The First Tee will use the iPads as youth participants go over lessons and take assessment quizzes during the teacher-supervised lesson times. Last year The First Tee provided high quality, comprehensive after-school programs to youth in strategic locations and Vitense Golfland and Cherokee Country Club. The third location at Nine Springs Golf Course opened in April of 2018. A program day at the Learning Center includes one hour of academic support from a trained mentor and one hour of Life Skills instruction from The First Tee coach. The expanded Learning Center programming ensures that participants have the resources, instruction, mentoring, and learning environment to succeed academically, socially, and personally, while growing into contributing members of society.

Verona Area School District: $9,600 for the Robotics for All program. Vex robotics is a leader in creating kits that allow students to explore robotics in a number of exciting and engaging ways. Students design, build, program, and try out their creations. They then evaluate, innovate and retest their ideas, gaining a sense of what it is like to work in the field of robotics. The students will interactively present their work with elementary students in the district. This gives an additional level of purpose, authenticity and leadership for them.

Walbridge School: $1,890 for iPads, cases and Voice Dream Suite and Writing Wizard applications. Walbridge School is a small school serving 25-40 students on a yearly basis. The vast majority of the students have a specific learning disability that makes it hard for them to succeed in a traditional classroom. Computer developers are beginning to perfect applications that are designed to support some of the most common learning disabilities. The Voice Dream Reader and Writer were developed for students with dyslexia and ADD whose eyes are often distracted by all the words on a page. This application allows the reader to limit the revealed text to anywhere from one to five lines of text so that their brains are not as distracted.  Writing Wizard is an interactive application that helps students with dysgraphia with their letters and number formation. This application encourages the students’ efforts with sound cues and with the ability to play with the “letters” once they are correctly formed.

Wisconsin Public Television: $10,000 for the production and development of a new online Wisconsin Capitol educational game. Thousands of Wisconsin students visit the State Capitol every year, and this project creates educator-informed learning tools – tied to Wisconsin Standards of Learning – to enhance studies before and after those visits. This project will create accessibility for students and teachers who are unable to access the State Capitol tour experience.  This game will allow all Wisconsin K-12 students to access the content and educational opportunities of the Capitol building without having to leave their schools. It will address learning targets that are difficult to teach with existing resources, such as explain the basic purpose of government in American society, recognizing the three levels of government, and explain how various forms of civic action such as running for political office, voting, speaking at hearings, can contribute to the well-being of the community.

YWCA: $20,000 for continued support for the second year of YWeb Career Academy, a 3 month free IT boot camp. YWeb Career Academy is a 3 month intensive program that teaches skills needed to be web developers and designers. Upon completion of the program, students are placed in internships or full-time employment with the goal of increasing diversity within tech fields.  The class covers job readiness, team building, hands on learning in computer programming and assistance is finding an internship or employment.