Thank you to The Education Foundation of Central DeWitt for awarding over $60,000 in grants to our teachers and students this year! The 2025 grant recipients were honored last Thursday at the annual Education Foundation Appreciation Reception, catered by Ms. Sullivan and her talented CDHS culinary students.
Guests also enjoyed a special presentation from sixth-grade students, who demonstrated one of the drones purchased with grant funding from the Ed Foundation. It was an exciting, first-hand look at how impactful these grants are in directly enhancing student learning.
Over the past 31 years, the Ed Foundation has awarded more than $889,000 in grants to Central DeWitt educators — an incredible investment in our schools and community. A heartfelt thank you to them, and the donors who make these opportunities possible. And, congratulations to this year’s recipients!
GRANTS AWARDED
• ART DOCUMENT CAMERA ($490) This project will allow students to receive visual representation of skills and techniques that can be transferred to their own art practices. Students will also be able to display their artwork through this technology. This will be used daily for all levels at CDS. The camera will also support the Visual Art standards: Connecting, Creating, Responding, and Presenting.
Funded by The Education Foundation of Central DeWitt General Fund and The Education Foundation of Central DeWitt Grant Fund
• BREWIN BUDDIES COFFEE COMPANY ($2,935) The high school coffee company called ‘Brewin Buddies’ is a fully integrated coffee shop that makes and delivers coffee, and more, to high school staff. General Education and Special Education students will practice communication, math, and reading skills together.
Funded by the DeWitt Bank and Trust's Central DeWitt Skilled Trade Fund, The First Central State Bank School to Work Endowment, the Warren Waack Endowment, the Stuedemann Endowment for Skilled Trades, the James D. Owen Jr Foundation Fund and the William “Bill” Turnis Endowment
• CALMING CORNER/SPACE ($394) Students may feel angry, overwhelmed, sad, anxious, etc and may utilize this space to help calm their bodies so they are ready to learn.
Funded by The Education Foundation of Central DeWitt Grant Fund
• CAMERA EQUIPMENT ($444) This grant is intended to purchase camera equipment to produce the high school yearbook and for the Scholastic Journalism elective course.
Funded by The Bill and Shirley Homrighausen Journalism Endowment
• CHILDREN'S BOOK FOR 2ND GRADE STUDENTS ($1,600) This grant provides second grade students at Ekstrand with a copy of Katlin Truelsen's first hardcover children's book, “Buckin' Bull Buddies.” This book is part of Katlin's FFA SAE in Ag Communications.
Funded by The Bill and Shirley Homrighausen Journalism Endowment, the Robert and Phyllis Parrott Endowment for Language Arts and Journalism, the William “Bill” Turnis Endowment and The Education Foundation of Central DeWitt General Fund
• CHOCOLATE COLLECTION IN AMPLIFY GUEST SPEAKER ($200) The guest speaker will engage students in meaningful learning by connecting the topic to tangible examples and fostering curiosity about botany, agriculture, and sustainability.
Funded by the William “Bill” Turnis Endowment
• CKLA Character Corner ($772) Create a character corner in our classroom with plush characters that align with our stories in the CKLA Skills decodable readers.
Funded by the James D. Owen Jr Foundation Fund
• DRAMATIC PLAY CENTERS ($1,672) Students with significant disabilities benefit from repetition with variety. Engaging in play-based activities while practicing letters and communication vocabulary strengthens connections and enhances learning.
Funded by The Education Foundation of Central DeWitt General Fund
• EKSTRAND NEW SCHOOL YEAR PREP ($1,850) To reduce the personal funds needed for everyone to get their classrooms and the facility ready for students at the start of the school year.
Funded by Dave Weiskircher in memory of Beth Weiskircher
• FALL PARENT TEACHER CONFERENCE MEAL ($455) Provide dinner to teachers during fall parent teacher conferences at the middle school and high school
Funded by The Education Foundation of Central DeWitt General Fund
• GAME ON ($600) Invite students from classes during their TA or WIN time to come into the classroom and play games with students that have differing abilities to allow friendships to develop between students who don’t otherwise have the opportunity to interact.
Funded by the James D. Owen Jr Foundation and the Wilma Owen Endowment
• GAMES FOR BUILDING (FACT/MATH) FLUENCY ($987) These games help first and second grade students build fact fluency which is one of the math goals in these grade levels.
Funded by The Education Foundation of Central DeWitt General Fund
• GOPRO CREATOR KIT ($953) The GoPro Camera Kit will be used in the Multimedia class and Robotics program in the High School for video production.
Funded by the Henry Pelham High School STEM Endowment
• INTERACTIVE TOUCHSCREEN FLAT PANELS ($30,000) These new interactive panels will improve student engagement and transform traditional lessons into lively, hands-on learning experiences.
Funded by the Helen Jeanne Helble Endowment, Henry R Pelham Education Fund and The Education Foundation of Central DeWitt General Fund
• JUMPSTART & KINDERGARTEN MATH CENTERS ($1,936) These centers will engage students with tasks or activities that support them in becoming skilled readers and think flexibly and fluently about numbers.
Funded by the Carolyn Hilmers Ruggeberg Endowment and The Education Foundation of Central DeWitt General Fund
• JUMPSTART DRAMATIC PLAY CURRICULUM MATERIALS ($1,975) The requested materials for the themed centers allow children to better engage with the topics and immerse themselves in the content, giving them the opportunity to explore topics more deeply and with close to real life experiences.
Funded by The Education Foundation of Central DeWitt General Fund
• NUMERACY MATH INTERVENTION PROJECT ($624) Numeracy Math Intervention Project is a system that provides diagnostic assessments, interventions, and progress monitoring tools for students who have unfinished learning in mathematics.
Funded by The Education Foundation of Central DeWitt Grant Fund and The Education Foundation of Central DeWitt General Fund
• OZOBOTS ($1,290) The Ozobots allow general education middle school students in the Peer STEM class to explore programming, computer science, and engineering design processes with a purpose or mission as a goal.
Funded by The Education Foundation of Central DeWitt General Fund
• PORTABLE SOUND SYSTEM AND WIRELESS MICROPHONES ($1,000) This portable sound system and four wireless microphones supports numerous assemblies and plays throughout the year at the Intermediate school since the current equipment no longer met their needs.
Funded by The Education Foundation of Central DeWitt Grant Fund
• PRIMARY JOURNALS FOR BEGINNING WRITERS ($300) All 87 first grade students are given a notebook to write dictation sentences in and keep for their parents to see their growth in handwriting, letter formation, and dictation throughout the year.
Funded by the Robert and Phyllis Parrott Endowment for Language Arts and Journalism
• SKILLED TRADES TOOLS FOR SHOP AND JOB SITE ($2,025) These new tools will support additional modules to expand the student's skill set through the industrial technology program that can be applied directly to the trades in the real world: masonry, plumbing, electrical, framing, and roofing.
Funded by the First Central State Bank School to Work Endowment and the Stuedemann Endowment for Skilled Trades
• SPECIAL OLYMPICS UNIFIED DRUMLINE T-SHIRTS ($600) General education middle school students will work one on one with level 2 & 3 special education students in 4th-8th grades to create a Unified Drumline with Color Changing LED Light Up Drumsticks.
Funded by the Lyndsey Hanas Memorial Endowment for Special Education and Special Olympics
• SPREADING KINDNESS WITH THE KINDNESS CREW ($500) The 5th and 6th grade Kindness Crew engages in activities throughout the school and community to spread kindness. This includes leaving kindness notes on lockers, visits to Fieldstone, and greeting staff & students with kindness on Friday mornings.
Sponsored annually by IH Mississippi Valley Credit Union
• Student Fine Arts Equipment Support ($2,963) Move stage curtains forward and purchase some storage and organization equipment to better facilitate our stage area to create a more authentic & professional environment for performances.
Funded by the Fred and Doris Gerdes Fine Arts Endowment, the Anne Volkman Endowment, the DeWitt Area Fine Arts Foundation, The Education Foundation of Central DeWitt General Fund and The Education Foundation of Central DeWitt Grant Fund
• TWO BY TWO - KINDHEARTED KIDS ($2,030) The program teaches students about kindness, empathy, responsibility, generosity and citizenship. The magical journey of becoming a Kindhearted Kid begins with the adoption of a stuffed dog or cat.
Funded by the DeWitt Pet Hospital, the DeWitt Vet Clinic, Brandon Hunt and others who donated directly to the program
• UKULELE CLUB ($800) Ukulele-shaped storage cart for the Ukulele Club’s Ukuleles
Funded directly through the DeWitt Area Fine Arts Foundation
• UNIFIED BOOK CLUB ($1,055) The Unified Book Club is a formal dedicated area in the library with books that will provide structured opportunities for students to explore differences, recognize similarities, and build inclusive, supportive friendships.
Funded by the Barbara K. Dull & Max J. Dull Endowment and The Bill and Shirley Homrighausen Journalism Endowment
If you are interested in donating to The Education Foundation of Central DeWitt or creating an endowment fund, please reach out to edfoundation@cd-csd.org or call/text Brett McKamey at (563) 650-5985.
