Feature Article May 15,2003
LAND O' LAKES NewsWeb HomeMini-grant for Northern Learning Centre at Land O' Lakes PS
The Youth Action Committee (YAC) of the Community Foundation of Greater Kingston has inaugurated a program whereby small grants, under $300, are made to elementary school students for community related projects.
The first grant to be presented under this new program was to Land O Lakes PS in Mountain Grove. Seven students in the Northern Learning Centre class at the school received money to buy paint and other supplies, which they have used to initiate a project of sprucing up the area around the Mountain Grove rink. Jason Wagar, a student at Frontenac High School in Kingston and the chair of Youth Advisory Committee, made a presentation to the class on Friday, along with Jen My. On Monday, the students were hard at work painting the two outbuildings at the rink site.
The idea behind the min-grants came from a conference of community foundations which took place in Kelowna last year. At the conference, there were many ideas coming forward from YACs. The group from Vancouver had a neighbourhood granting program, which we adapted to form the mini-grant program here, said Jason.
The program was funded from a few sources, including the Investors Group and from a Money for Time program at GAP INC. The Limestone Learning Foundation helped us out by sending our submission package to the schools in the Limestone School board along with their own package, and we got a lot more than we were expecting, Wagar said.
The mini-grant program is intended for use in elementary schools because YAC has been involved with older youth groups in the past, and felt younger children had been neglected.
We were looking for projects that fostered a commitment to the greater community. The Land O Lakes submission was a great example of that. The students were all involved in the application, and they are all working on the project, Wagar said.
The mini-grant program received one-time funding this year, but Jason Wagar said YAC is looking for a permanent donor to fund the project from year to year.Student groups in 15 more schools in Kingston, Frontenac, and Lennox & Addington Counties are also slated to receive grants. The Grade 7s and 8s at Prince Charles PS in Verona will receive one towards the development of an outdoor classroom, and Grade 2 students at North Addington Education Centre in Cloyne will receive a grant to purchase bedding plants to put in planters throughout the school grounds.
