September 21, 2000; Hampton, NH – The Unitil Charitable Foundation has announced the winners of the Peter J. Stulgis Memorial Fund Grants for this year: Austin Preparatory School, FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology), Lawrence High School, Merrimack Valley High School, NH Science Instrumentation Program, St. Thomas Aquinas High School, and Sanborn Regional High School.
The winning projects are located in Massachusetts and New Hampshire, with each project receiving approximately $5,000. The combined grant awards this year total nearly $35,000. All the winners are being recognized for the distinctive ways they integrated technology hardware and software into the secondary education classrooms or learning environments.
"The Stulgis Fund has awarded nearly $100,000 in technology grants over the past three years – this year we were very impressed with the heightened technical quality reflected in the applications," said George Gantz, president of the Unitil Charitable Foundation. "Twenty schools and organizations applied and they all did an outstanding job of creating innovative programs involving technology and actively engaging students in hands-on participation and learning. The seven winners selected in our competitive review process will be implementing programs with very positive impact on students."
The winners include (alphabetical order):
- Austin Preparatory School (Reading, MA) for the purchase of the Pasco Science Workshop 750 Physics Bundle. This includes sensor technology to be used while conducting experiments in areas including mechanics, electricity and magnetism, optics and sounds, nuclear physics and thermodynamics. With the sensors, students will be able to see their results directly in front of them for their evaluation and conclusions. The system will allow teachers to move from a lecture-based curriculum to more hands-on training for the students.
- FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology) (Manchester, NH) for the FIRST LEGO League Tournament in NH. The initial eight-week program is a robotics challenge for middle school students that gives them a hands-on learning experience in science and technology. Students are required to build a robot that will help solve a current technological or scientific problem facing the world. This year’s challenge presents the scenario of a town in close proximity to an erupting volcano. At the end of the program, the students will participate in the first NH State Tournament. The estimated turnout will bring together approximately 600 students and teachers from New Hampshire, Vermont, and Maine.
- Lawrence High School (Lawrence, MA) to purchase software enabling their students an opportunity to share their work with others logged on in cyberspace. The English as a Second Language teachers, English as a Second Language Computer Lab teacher, and the Mathematics Computer Lab teacher will be working with the new software in their classes. Students’ portfolios will be developed and then later placed on a student created web folio. The language classes will greatly benefit from being able to write and to share many styles of writing. The math classes will be able to use several software programs and a graphing calculator in their presentations to the web folio. The project gives the students a wonderful opportunity to use the computers and the different software programs. For many of the students, this is their first experience with a computer.
- Merrimack Valley High School (Penacook, NH) for a roof mounted solar photovoltaic system. This particular system will produce approximately 1400 kilowatts of electricity each year and help to prevent nearly 1550 pounds of carbon dioxide from being released into the atmosphere. The solar array and monitoring system will allow students and community members to learn about the application of alternative energy (solar and other renewable) sources.
- NH Science Instrumentation Program (Durham, NH) to provide a class set of Wavefunction’s Spartan Molecular Modeling software. Teachers will be trained on this software and will incorporate it into their classroom activities. This program will enable the students to use current tools of science to view, build, and manipulate the particles that make up the materials found in our world.
- St. Thomas Aquinas High School (Dover, NH) to purchase a Calculator Based Laboratory for their curriculum. It consists of a portable collecting device, joined with a graphing calculator designed to retrieve and analyze experimental data. This lab will serve the Biology, Chemistry and Physics classes at the school.
- Sanborn Regional High School (Kingston, NH) for the purchase of computer software and hardware, supplying a foundation to create several student run publications. These include the Sanborn Regional High School Quarterly Report, Argosy (a literary publication), the school newspaper, the senior print yearbook, and a senior CD yearbook.
The Peter J. Stulgis Memorial Fund was established in 1997 to provide charitable grants and awards promoting the development and implementation of advanced electronic and computer technology applications for educational purposes in secondary schools. The Fund honors the late Peter J. Stulgis, who was the Chairman and CEO of Unitil Corporation until his death in May 1997. An Advisory Committee consisting of colleagues, friends, and family of Peter J. Stulgis made the grant selections. Anyone interested in donating to the Fund can send a check, payable to Peter J. Stulgis Memorial Fund, to Unitil Charitable Foundation, 6 Liberty Lane West, Hampton, NH 03842.
The Unitil Charitable Foundation is an independent private foundation created to facilitate tax deductible contributions to the Peter J. Stulgis Memorial Fund, to administer the Fund and to conduct other charitable activities.
Contact
George Gantz
gantz@unitil.com
Corporate Office
Liberty Lane West
Hampton, NH 03842-1720
800/999-6501
