On Friday, May 12, the Ed Fund will hold its 29th Annual Soaring to Excellence Celebration to honor the achievements of educators from West Contra Costa County.

The Ed Fund has partnered with the West Contra Costa Literacy Coalition to champion summer learning as one of the largest needs in our community. Together, our goal is to support an additional 1,000 children to enroll and participate in high quality programs in summer 2017.

The five 2017 Teaching Excellence Awardees were announced Friday, February 3rd during surprise visits to the winners’ classrooms by administrators, colleagues, trustees, parents, and family members who presented them with banners and flowers in front of their students.

The Ed Fund is working to create educational environments where our students thrive and succeed in their chosen endeavors. This past year, in a strategic planning process with our community partners we asked the question, “What can we do to help our students graduate from high school ready to succeed in college and their chosen career?”

Thousands of students don’t go to college simply because they believe that they can’t afford it. Last year, more than $2.7 billion in financial aid went unclaimed.

As the new year approaches, I wanted to share with you the impact supporters like you have allowed us to make this year in support of public education in West Contra Costa County. We would not have been able to achieve these accomplishments without your generous participation and support.

When you walk into a freshman English class at Kennedy High School and ask the students how many of them want to go to college, nearly all hands go up. However, the reality is that only 28% of graduating seniors from the class of 2015 completed their A-G requirements – the coursework necessary to attend a 4-year public university in California.

Our kids and this program represent the hope and promise of our collaborative effort. Through continued involvement in high quality after school and summer programs, our kids will continue to build the skills and academic acumen to begin closing the achievement gap in West Contra Costa.

The Ed Fund is working to create educational environments where our students thrive and succeed in their chosen endeavors. This past year, in a strategic planning process with our community partners we asked the question, “What can we do to help our students graduate from high school ready to succeed in college and their chosen career?”

As First Lady Michelle Obama states so eloquently in her video featured in our August newsletter, we want all of our kids to take part in summer programming to build new skills, prevent summer learning loss, and return to school ready to
succeed.