Schools
Minneapolis Schools Snag $13 Million in Grants
Southwest schools will benefit from increased literacy and career counseling support.
The cold, dreary weather outside the Anne Sullivan school on Monday morning contrasted with the excitement of Minneapolis Public Schools officials inside the building as they, Mayor R.T. Rybak, and representatives of four major Twin Cities companies announced a $13 million package of grants to the school district.
The money will help the district recruit rockstar principals, standardize the Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM) curriculum across all district schools, bring the Minnesota Reading Corps into every elementary school to help struggling readers and will continue funding for each high school’s College and Career Centers.
“They will get the best education in crossing cultural barriers that you can ever get,” said Rybak, echoing praise for Minneapolis Public Schools from Cargill, Target, General Mills and Medtronic officials. “The diverse population of Minneapolis schools is the secret weapon in Minnesota’s goal of being globally competitive."
Most of these projects—teaching reading, principal recruitment and college readiness—would typically be considered part of a school district’s primary functions.
“The district has lost $100 million in the last decade. The district can’t fund its own core mission because of what’s happend in this state,” said Pam Costain, CEO of AchieveMpls, the district’s fundraising arm, which wrangled the package of grants. “Not only do we desperately need the state to step up to the plate, but we need private partners to come in and supplement [our funding] as well.”
Southwest Minneapolis’ schools will benefit extensively from these grants, school and corporate officials said. Washburn and Southwest High Schools’ College and Career Centers will get another three years of funding from Cargill. The centers cost about $1 million each, half of which is provided by MPS, and half by Cargill with help from a few other private donors.
In addition to funding the placement of two Minnesota Reading Corps tutors in every district elementary school, Target is convening a panel of experts to develop new interventions to help struggling readers. Costain said the panel will include MPS’s reading specialists, and not just Target’s appointees.
