KISD Education Foundation Prize Patrol

With celebratory cheer in abundance, two bands of gift-toting community leaders made a large group of Killeen ISD teachers very happy a week-and-a-half before the holiday break.

The Killeen ISD Education Foundation grant patrol traveled in two groups along two routes Wednesday, crisscrossing the school district to deliver 30 grants in 20 locations totaling more than $103,000.

The groups, made up of a variety of KISD administrators, foundation board members and grant sponsors stopped by 19 schools to barge into classrooms and other spaces to surprise the winning teachers.

“The best part of our grant patrol, year after year, is the genuine surprised reaction from the grant recipients,” said Foundation Director Leslie Gilmore. “That is why we absolutely love doing grant patrol because of the fun and excitement from the recipients and the students.”

At each stop, the visiting patrol members gathered available campus administrators and anyone else available and willing and used noisemakers to announce their presence as they made their way to the winning teachers.

Once identified, teachers received a large check, balloons and a chance to explain to their gift-givers their plans for their grant.

Those plans ranged from a reading challenge among high schools to a budding audiovisual club, learning with Legos, a planned visit to an area book festival, instruments for elementary music classes, all kinds of science and technology, updated library resources and much more.

Not that it’s a competition, but only one school – Trimmier Elementary – secured three separate grants. Together, those three grants covered kindergarten through fifth grade and addressed math, reading and a combination of robotics, math and science.

“It is super exciting and feels really rewarding knowing I can help students in amazing ways,” said Caitlin Dunnells, Trimmier first-grade teacher about her $2,145 “Moving With Math” grant that will provide supplies to help integrate movement into learning math.

Another Trimmier Elementary grant, “Lego Lair Learners,” mixes robotics, STEM and coding with Lego building blocks.

“We will be able to integrate STEM and coding in the different grade levels,” said instructional coach Shantay Cordova. “I know science is important across the district. We need to work with starting in the primary grades and have science and STEM throughout the grade levels.”

When kindergarten teacher Karmen Ingraffia found out about the grant application, she was thrilled to jump on board for the benefit of her younger students.

“Extending that coding and science and math is awesome,” she said. “She made sure to include the primary level (in the grant). Including the younger kids to get them started on that path to get them ready, so when they get to the older grades, it’s going to be amazing.”

The delivery included a $2,500 Reading Challenge grant shared by the high schools, as well as the annual $10,000 grant to support the annual Elementary Science Olympiad, a $10,000 grant for an elementary Battle of the Books set for next spring and a $2,500 grant to inaugurate an elementary UIL academic event.

The district’s Education Foundation awards grants to teachers for classroom activities each fall and for professional development in the spring. The foundation also awards a large volume of college scholarships to seniors. All funding comes from local donors.

“They will be able to get up and move and actually be able to use math in the movement,” she said. “My students love to move.”
“Our generous donors and partners allow the foundation the ability to partner with KISD in enhancing the experiences for students on the campuses across the district.”

This semester’s grants include the following:

Brookhaven ES “Relax, Relate and Release” $4,741

Chaparral HS “Shutterbugs Society” $2,500

Clifton Park ES “We’ve Caught the Fluency Bug” $1,892

Fowler ES “Inside Out” $2,973

Harker Heights HS “Lego Up in the Library” $1,561

Hay Branch ES “Extreme Science Room Makeover” $4,993, “Gelling and Spelling” $345

Haynes ES “Math and Literacy Centers” $3,774

Ira Cross ES “Family Engagement Game Night” $1,912, “Bridging the Gap” $2,045

Level Up High School Reading Challenge $2,500

Liberty Hill MS “Turning Pages” $515

Meadows ES “Riveting our Ravenous Readers” $4,000

Peebles ES “Access to Literacy” $4,995, “Kinesthetically Kinder” $1,282

Reeces Creek ES “Judge a Book by Its Cover” $4,910

Saegert ES “Full STEAM Ahead” $4,908, “Growing with Instruments” $1,032

Skipcha ES “Flexible Classroom Seating” $2,381

Timber Ridge ES “Reading Tug-Of-War” $4,537

Trimmier “Moving with Math” $2,145, “Reading is a Slam Dunk” $4,692, “Lego Lair Learners” $3,029

Venable Village ES “Endangered Species Showoff” $1,875, “Fly Away with Fiction” $2,488

Willow Springs ES “Instrumental Play” $3,687, “Little Scientists, Big Discoveries” $5,000

Science Olympiad $10,000

Elementary Battle of the Books $10,000

Elementary UIL $2,500