The P-H-M Education Foundation has wrapped up the grant announcements for the 2023-2024 school year; and it’s been a big year with tons of recipients. Elsie Rogers was the recipient of two grants for a total of $1,059.90!

Jodi Cramer-Berry and Jessie Kinney applied for and received $809.95 to purchase six Beebots, a charging station, and coding mats to bring innovation and hands-on learning into the classrooms. The kits will introduces foundations of computer programming to students allowing teachers to transform traditional lessons into engaging, interactive experiences fostering critical thinking, problem-solving and teamwork amongst students.

We also applied for and received one EZ Grant:

• $249.95 for 5th grade students writing and publishing tools

This cycle the Foundation Grants Committee awarded $42,819.63 in funding to 15 EZ grants and 20 traditional grants. 

PHMEF has moved to one grant cycle per school year, now moved to the Fall, to allow teachers and schools time to put their grant dollars to good use right away.

Executive Director Jennifer Turnblom traveled across the district to surprise various grant recipients with the good news of their funding amount. Grants awarded this year cover a wide array of innovative programs and activities from $10,000 to Grissom Middle School to purchase keyboards for the music room to fishing poles for Penn’s Fishing Club.

Click here to see the photo gallery on the District’s website of the check deliveries or click to follow PHMEF’s Facebook page.

Superintendent Dr. Jerry Thacker awarded three more P-H-M teachers with the Impact Award today (Monday, October 2). Dr. Thacker visited Walt Disney Elementary, Elsie Rogers Elementary and Grissom Middle School. Awards handed out this time around were to the following teachers:

• Matt Serge, 3^rd grade teacher at Walt Disney
• Kara Flanagan, 1^st grade teacher at Elsie Rogers
• Josh Kelver, 8^th grade ELA teacher at Grissom Middle School

The P-H-M Impact Award is presented to educators who have helped their students achieve individual academic growth on their formative assessments over time. All P-H-M teachers across the district are dedicated to helping their students achieve personal academic success. The P-H-M Impact Award is shining the spotlight on those teachers who are showing the most significant overall student growth during the 2022-2023 school year. They are prime examples of how our teachers and students achieve P-H-M Excellence!

Dr. Thacker popped in and surprised the teachers with the help of the school principals, Disney’s Dr. Higginson, Elsie’s Christy Campbell, and Grissom’s Jenn Sinclair. Dr. Thacker was also joined by P-H-M administrators Assistant Superintendent Dr. Heather Short and Director of Professional Development Dr. Lavon Dean-Null.

At Elsie, the team caught Kara Flanagan completely off-guard. Her students really got into the surprise. Mrs. Flanagan had the highest growth of all P-H-M Title I first grade teachers! 90% of her students had average or higher growth for their overall Dibels composite growth; and 58% of her students were in the “above average” or “well above average” categories! Check out all the photos of today’s award presentations on Facebook.

Matt Serge was recognized for having the highest growth in ELA of all Title I 3rd grade teachers in P-H-M! Mr. Serge’s class went from 9% (Clear Sight) to 55% proficiency on ILEARN; that’s 21% higher than average Title I proficiency growth!

Josh Kelver had the highest growth class section in 8th grade ELA across P-H-M (15% higher than the second highest class)! Mr. Kelver’s class went from 8% proficiency at the beginning of year, to 75% proficiency on ILEARN. That’s the highest average growth across all 8th grade P-H-M ELA teachers! Because Mr. Kelver’s wife, Ashley Kelver, also works at Grissom, she was able to be included in the the surprise. 

We thank the P-H-M Education Foundation for covering the cost of the awards.

There are more P-H-M teachers to recognize in the days, weeks and months ahead!

PennPALS will be holding Open Houses on Wednesday, August 16. Please attend the session that corresponds to your child’s time of attendance.

• A.M. Classes: 11:00 a.m. – 12:00 p.m.
• P.M. Classes: 1:00 – 1:30 p.m.