Dave Zweifel, long-time Editor of the Capital Times, joined Superintendent Art Rainwater at the May 7, 2007 Board of Education meeting to congratulate and recognize this year's winners of mini-grants from The Evjue Foundation.

At it has for so many years now, The Evjue Foundation has granted the district $25,000 to support special programs and projects developed by district staff. Each year a district committee, headed by Teaching & Learning Executive Director Lisa Wachtel, solicits proposals from staff throughout the district and selects those most worthy of receiving a portion of The Evjue Foundation's annual $25,000 grant. This year's Evjue grant winners include:

• Falk Elementary School's "Family Math Story Hours," $5,000 (Project Leader: 2-3 teacher Mary Ann DeVries);
• Glendale Elementary School's "Collaboration, Shared Ownership and Coaching Model," $5,000 (Project Leader: Principal Mickey Buhl);
• Leopold Elementary School's "Unity Parent Group," $4,070 (Project Leader: 2nd grade teacher Theresa Sanders):
• Teaching & Learning Department's "Logging On to Literacy Leadership," $6,200 (Project Leader: Intermediate Literacy Resource Teacher Mary Jo Ziegler); and
• The District's School Improvement Team's "Creating Above-the-Line Classrooms and Schools," $4,730 (Project Leader: School Improvement Planner Ron Lott).

Superintendent Rainwater also took the opportunity to thank Mr. Zweifel for the decades of support that The Evjue Foundation has provided to the district.

"In these times, when it's so hard to find the money for program improvement, we deeply appreciate the steady and generous support of the Evjue Foundation that helps keep our frontline staff dreaming and innovating on behalf of our community's children," he said.

The Evjue Foundation, the charitable giving arm of the Capital Times daily newspaper, is one of our community's leading philanthropic institutions. This latest $25,000 grant to the district was part of over $1.9 million in grants recently announced by the Foundation.