Alma Perez Hernandez still remembers unpacking boxes of Dog Man, Captain Underpants, and Frog and Toad. Her students would gather around her, and she would introduce each new book before it ever touched a shelf.
This was in 2021, Perez Hernandez’s first year as a resource specialist teacher. She used a Chamberlin Education Foundation (CEF) Gratitude Grant to replace outdated 1980s books with titles her students actually wanted to read.
They talked about the pictures. They guessed at the stories. Then the books went into the Learning Center at Caesar Chavez Elementary. Soon enough, students started treating the space like a library. Some books never came back. She didn’t mind.
“Whatever it takes,” she said. “It’s fine, at least they’re reading.”
Since 2015, CEF has awarded more than 9,880 teacher Gratitude Grants totaling $2.5 million to help West Contra Costa public school educators diversify classroom libraries, purchase math manipulatives, download digital learning tools, refresh art supplies, and more.
This year, CEF awarded grants to 1,180 educators across nearly every West Contra Costa public school, distributing $354,000 dollars in Gratitude Grant funds.
Year after year, teachers like Perez Hernandez, Veronica Adams, and Astrid Howard-Taylor are accustomed to paying out of their own pockets for classroom materials. Gratitude Grants help alleviate some of the costs teachers incur to support their students.
Perez Hernandez now serves students from TK to sixth grade in her school’s Learning Center. She has applied for a Gratitude Grant every year since she started five years ago. Each year, she sees a new need.
After books came hands-on phonics materials. This year, she is focusing on math. She noticed more students developing deficits in math and wanted tangible tools for fractions, place value, and multiplication.
She said the Gratitude Grants have been a game-changer. “I sometimes even say it out loud: ‘Oh, I might be able to buy this when the Chamberlin grant comes in,” she said.
Veronica Adams is in her 29th year of teaching first grade at Peres Elementary. This is her fifth year receiving a Gratitude Grant. She used past grants to buy comfy, cushy chairs for her reading carpet and art supplies, such as watercolors, glitter, pipe cleaners, and a hot glue gun.
“They really blossom when they work on a project,” she said.
Adams said she spends about $1,000 out of pocket each year on her classroom. She doesn’t want to ask families who may be struggling to donate.
“I want to give my students the best opportunity to have fun in the classroom and learn,” she said.
Astrid Howard Taylor, a first-grade teacher at Sheldon Elementary, has been at the school for 12 years. She has been applying for Gratitude Grants for seven or eight years.
This year, she used the grant to buy materials for a diorama habitat project. Her students research animals, visit the Oakland Zoo, and then build their own habitat. The grant pays for boxes, paint, figurines, and fake grass and plants.
“I like hands-on projects where the students can learn by building, by exploring, by problem solving, maybe a little bit of engineering involved as well,” she said.
Without the grant, she said she would have had to make it a group project with one diorama per class. Now every student builds their own.
“The grant made this project possible,” she said. “Not just imagine the habitat, but actually build it.”
A first grade student in Howard-Taylor’s classroom shared, “It’s fun making my desert habitat and I love making the snakes!”
The Gratitude Grant is very helpful, Howard-Taylor said, in supporting her students’ learning and lessening her financial burden. And because she can reapply each school year, she can do a different project with each new class.
“It’s great because every year I have a different classroom,” she said. “I don’t really have the same materials for a project for next year, so I’m glad I can apply again.”
