News Release
Friday, July 3, 2009
NEA Foundation Promotes Grant Program; Presents Nobel Prize nominee at 2009 NEA Expo
Washington, D.C. (July, 3 2009) - Thousands of educators visited the NEA Foundation’s booth at the NEA’s 2009 Expo in San Diego to learn more about the Foundation’s grants, for a chance to win an iPod Touch, and to pick up a coveted NEA Foundation “Need a Grant?” bag.
Foundation staff answered hundreds of questions
about its Student Achievement and Learning & Leadership grants
throughout the two and a half days that the Expo was held.
On July 2, the NEA Foundation hosted a
presentation and book signing for Nobel Peace Prize nominee and
bestselling author of “Three Cups of Tea,” Greg Mortenson. The author enthusiastically thanked about 400 educators who gathered to hear him speak. He
encouraged them to continue their work to educate young Americans and
to cultivate student service learning opportunities to promote world
peace by building understanding and appreciation between different
cultures.
The NEA Foundation has supported the work of
Mortenson’s organization, Pennies for Peace, to develop an online
service learning toolkit designed for K-12 educators to create
effective penny-raising campaigns to build schools in Afghanistan and
Pakistan as part of their school’s curriculum.
The toolkit provides a standards-aligned
service learning curriculum for all grade levels, including classroom
activities, fact sheets, maps provided by National Geographic, and
videos about life and culture in Afghanistan and Pakistan. The materials can be downloaded for free from www.penniesforpeace.org.
These school-based campaigns are gathering momentum and making a difference. In 2006, there were less than 100 US schools participating. Today there are over 4,000. As of 2009, Pennies for Peace has established over 90 schools in rural and often volatile regions of Pakistan and Afghanistan, which provide education to over 34,000 children, including 24,000 girls where few education opportunities existed before.
About The NEA Foundation
The NEA Foundation is a public charity supported by contributions from educators' dues, corporate sponsors, and others who support public education initiatives.We partner with education unions, districts, and communities to create powerful, sustainable improvements in teaching and learning. Visit www.neafoundation.org for more information. Find us on Facebook and Twitter, and visit our blog.