SRP awarding grants to dozens of Valley teachers

CHANDLER, Ariz. - Tabitha Hickey is a kindergarten teacher at Harford Sylvia Encinas Elementary School and she encourages her students to be creative, and now it's her turn.

"It would be really nice to have big-ticket items like technology, maybe more iPads for the classroom, you know anything that would help that was science or STEM," she said. "Anything that would be kind of out of the ordinary that we would ask the district for, so something like that that would benefit all the kids every year, a couple years," she said.

Hickey plans to apply for an SRP grant, in which she could potentially win thousands of dollars.

"The Learning Grant program is up to $5,000 that teachers can get for the social science program is up to $2,500," said Kevin Rolfe of SRP.

The application process, according to Rolfe, is all done online. SRP expects at least 80 teachers to apply and as many as 25 will be chosen.

"All the applications we get go to a committee," Rolfe said. "Decisions are made in late April, so if they are selected they will have their money early in May sometime."

Rolfe says past winners have purchased everything from basic supplies to electronic microscopes, and one even sent a hot-air balloon sky high.

"The times are changing and everything is going to evolve with using technology in different ways that would be a big-ticket item that I think we can ask for it would be very beneficial to the kids," Hickey said.

SRP Learning Grant
https://www.srpnet.com/education/grants/default.aspx