NORTHAMPTON — The Northampton Education Foundation has announced its latest round of grants for the city’s school district and vocational school, featuring projects including a new 3-D mapping program, a course in speculative fiction and a celebration of LGBTQ people of color.

The 12 grants total $23,578 for the upcoming Spring 2024 semester, with four given to Bridge Street Elementary School, three to Northampton High School, two each to JFK Middle School and Smith Vocational & Agricultural High School, and one to Jackson Street Elementary School.

Notable among the projects is a $3,000 grant for a 3-D mapping system for criminal justice students at Smith Vocational. The grant supplies new software and equipment for the creation of 3-D maps to assist with emergency response to all Northampton’s public schools.

“Smith Voc criminal justice educators currently teaching forensics will use their experience in the field to integrate the software and equipment into the curriculum and support students in collaborating around campus to increase the safety and security of all students,” the grant statement says. “Educators involved in this project also have a long-term goal to collaborate with the Northampton Public Schools and Northampton’s public safety professionals.”

Another grant in the amount of $2,510 will help JFK Middle School provide a new unit for seventh grade English language curriculum for learning about speculative fiction and its potential for exploring social critique. Students will have a chance to learn from Gregory Scott Katsoulis, the author of the young adult novel “All Rights Reserved,” on the process of creating works.

“The books selected to build this curriculum diversify the book options available to students, provide more accessible options for students of multiple learning levels and high needs students, and will benefit students beyond this first year,” the NEF grant states.

At Jackson Street Elementary School, $440 was given to fifth grade students for a research project centered on “queer heroes of color,” learning from primary and secondary sources, prioritizing the narratives of historical figures identified both with being people of color and within the LGBTQ community.

“Through community collaboration with Holyoke-based Sexual Minorities Archive, students will learn from primary and secondary sources, prioritizing the narratives of Black, Indigenous, and People of Color,” the grant states. “These narratives will inform students’ development of a poster, podcast, or short video demonstrating what they’ve learned, which they’ll share with the Jackson Street community.”

Next grant round open

In addition, the NEF is currently seeking requests for proposals for the upcoming 2024-2025 school year. Interested applicants should submit a proposal of no more than five pages and must include details such as a succinct description of the project, an assessment of the resources needed for the project and a statement of when the program will begin and how long it will last.

“A proposed project should bring something new and different to current practice or curricula in Northampton schools,” the NEF said in its request for proposals. “We prefer programs affecting large numbers of students, such as system-wide, school-wide, multi-grade programs, or those involving multiple schools.”

NEF grants programs are funded through annual donations from the community. The organization claims that since 1991, the date of its inception, it has invested more than $1 million in contributions into activities benefiting the Northampton Public Schools.

Alexander MacDougall can be reached at amacdougall@gazettenet.com.