The NEA Foundation

Danielle Kovach (above) accepts The NEA Member Benefits Award for Teaching Excellence.

On Friday, February 10, at our Salute to Excellence in Education Gala, Danielle Kovach, a special education teacher at Tulsa Trail Elementary School in Hopatcong, NJ, received one of public education’s top honors: The NEA Member Benefits Award for Teaching Excellence and $25,000. Kovach was selected from five Horace Mann Awards for Teaching Excellence recipients, who received special recognition at the

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The next great teaching frontier is light years away from chalk and erasers. Outside the classroom, students are fascinated and engaged in interactive technology and game-based activities. Should these new tools be limited to simple fun, or can they open new doors to learning? If we can leverage students’ fascination with games, and how they socialize online, can we also redefine the concept of teaching and learning?  We believe this is possible and necessary.

Why is this important?

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Want to learn something new? You're not alone...

Tomorrow, during Digital Learning Day, organizers expect more than a million students - thousands of teachers, hundreds of school districts and a majority of states - to celebrate innovative teaching and to encourage the use of technology in teaching and learning.

Educators, parents, and supporters of education will find a range of ways to participate on the Digital Learning Day website.

On this day, the NEA Foundation will invite

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One of our New Year’s resolutions was to find ways to fund more educators’ projects. Our new, $2,000 student achievement grants will help more teachers reach students with engaging classroom projects that will inspire learning. Also, in partnership with EarthEcho, we are offering new grants to support service-learning programs that improve the health of our water planet. The NEA Foundation-EarthEcho Water Planet Challenge grants are also for $2,000. Apply today just in time for

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Union-district teams in Lee County, FL; Springfield, MA; Omaha, NE; and Columbus, OH have been selected from among thousands of school districts nationwide to participate in the latest expansion of the NEA Foundation’s Closing the Achievement Gaps Initiative.

“When teachers, unions, and communities focus on learning conditions, student performance improves,” says the NEA Foundation President Harriet Sanford. “These teams join a national network of educators who

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For many teachers it’s classroom materials for their students. Hundreds of teachers across the country have received close to $170,000 worth of classroom materials over the past two months to support their ideas to inspire student learning. Thanks to a partnership between the NEA Foundation and Donors Choose, getting classroom materials to the students who need them is becoming easier. Since October, funded projects have grown from 80 to 600, and are reaching more than 52,000 students.

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Each NEA Foundation grantee has used grant funds to conduct high-quality classroom learning and/or professional development projects. We would like to hear from educators about their experiences.

How would you describe the most successful aspects or your project?

How have you been able to build upon the work that was supported with grant funding?

Please share your thoughts in the comment section below.

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Do you believe in the power of ideas? We do!

The NEA Foundation understands that the best way to help students learn is to help teachers teach. From bringing the alphabet to life with puppets, to showing students how germs spread, teachers have great ideas that are sure to inspire their students.

Too often teachers lack the resources to bring ideas like these to life. The NEA Foundation has partnered with DonorsChoose.org to give teachers and their students a helping hand.

So far, more than 80

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Read on to find out who will receive The Horace Mann Awards for Teaching Excellence, $10,000, and recognition as the nation’s top educators at the NEA Foundation’s Salute to Excellence in Education Gala in Washington, D.C.

They are:

• Lisa Esquibel, a Kindergarten teacher at Davis Elementary School in Cheyenne, WY, holds a Masters degree, ESL Endorsement, and Collaborative Literacy Intervention Project Certification;
• Jonathan Gillentine, a Pre-K teacher

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Want to learn how to incorporate mobile phone technology in your class?  These five educators have the answers.

The NEA Foundation created its Challenge to Innovate (C2i) to discover innovative approaches in teaching and to enable educators to share and build on these ideas to improve student learning. Find out how C2i Mobile Project national awardees are using mobile phone technology to change the way their students learn.

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