Foster Grants and Giving Inc. wants to humbly request grant support to fund our impactful programs. Our programming is comprised of areas that make an immediate and daily impact on vulnerable populations in our community. Our comprehensive program, Fostering High-Quality Education for All, was created to impact homeless students, their families, and under-resourced/underprivileged students in Central Florida. Everyone involved in the education industry knows about the severe learning loss that has occurred since the pandemic. It is projected that the pandemic learning loss could cost students $70,000.00 in lifetime earnings, which equates to 5.6% lower lifetime earnings. On top of that, a new report just surfaced that only 1 out of 5 graduates from the class of 2023 were fully prepared for college. It is a crucial time in education as 40% of new high school graduates are not meeting the ACT's college-readiness benchmarks in any subject, and only 21% met benchmarks in all four subjects. While we are on the college subject, the number of students from lower economic areas attended college 50% less often than in the previous three decades. These trends show a widening gap between higher and lower economic populations attending college. As you can clearly see, your support could not have come at a more imperative time. Your funding will be a beacon of hope for students from low-income families, students of color, English learners, children with disabilities, students experiencing homelessness, children in foster care, and migratory students. Additionally, our comprehensive programming supports literacy and remediation programs throughout our community for underserved students while providing evidence-based, intensive outside-the-school-day learning opportunities and summer enrichment for our students by providing in-person and virtual tutoring services, books, supplies, college prep services, and feeding programs.

Fostering High-Quality Education for All

During these unprecedented times, Fostering High-Quality Education for All is honored to support underserved students in Central Florida, help close learning gaps, and provide vital services to elementary, middle, and high school students during these uncertain times. Our organization has prioritized ensuring our programs are "accessible," not just "available," by providing transportation to students. Hence, they have the opportunity to benefit from the innovative programming offerings. Additionally, in order to execute our relationships and partnerships with individual underserved schools, it is understood that every supplemental activity or program performed will promote equity by making programs more accessible by providing content in sync with student needs and purposefully designing out-of-school-time programs to meet the specific and diverse needs of our students. This is done by integrating school-day equity supports into Out-of-School Time programs, such as professional development opportunities, culturally responsive/sustaining programming, and mental health supports. We are committed to supporting remediation and literacy programs to keep our students from falling behind due to the year and a half of academic learning loss from digital learning and school closures during the pandemic. In addition, we provide brand new books to underserved students and books to schools that serve low-income African Americans and students of color to create classroom libraries. Most importantly, we also provide high-impact and high-dosage tutoring to provide targeted tutoring to our struggling population of students who might be struggling more in one subject area than another, along with High-Quality Materials and Supports for intensive outside-the-school-day learning opportunities and summer enrichment programs that will help close learning gaps and address students' academic and youth development needs. Our tutoring and enrichment programs will impact our students' academic and youth development needs. Our programming will concentrate on literacy, science, technology, engineering, mathematics (STEM), and civics while supported by data-driven assessment results analysis. The personalized attention our students will receive will help pinpoint the root causes of their struggles while bridging gaps that will set up our students for a future of academic success and lead to the goal of improving grade-level reading by the end of our programming. Our literacy programs will engage research-based practices and implement literacy-rich schedules for identified students benefitting from these additional supports. In addition, our tutors will utilize high-quality materials and practices to ensure every student understands phonics, basic reading skills, vocabulary, spelling, reading comprehension, word meaning, critical thinking skills, and other identified needs.

Our College Prep program focuses on College-Going Culture, which refers to the environment, attitudes, and practices in schools and communities that encourage students and families to obtain the information, tools, and perspective to enhance access to and success in post-secondary education. We play a crucial role in supporting and preparing our students with resources to achieve their post-secondary school vision, goals, and dreams. While it is the student's responsibility to do the work, we take on the responsibility to help them navigate the complex process of getting ready and into higher education, the military, trade schools, or direct hire opportunities. We also focus intently on career planning as a process for post-secondary graduation planning and aligning post-graduation career plans with the chosen institution to get students to their goal quickly with minor investment and the greatest return. We will also engage in career-aligned educational activities, aligning career aspirations and educational programming that most efficiently prepares students for post-secondary goals. Our test preparation programs have been highly successful. The SAT and ACT tests are essential, but due to systemic and cultural challenges, many of our students do not have the GPA or test scores to get into a four-year university; we have to have options for them as well. That option includes Post-secondary Education Readiness Test (PERT) Preparation/Tutoring needed to enter community colleges. PERT tutoring has been crucial because over 60% of those students we serve can only get into a community college, and not passing the PERT will make them waste money and resources they do not have because they will have to take a high number of prep courses that do not count as college credit. We are helping students get an AA or AS degree in 2-3 years, where many of those students, if they do not drop out, will have to take 2-4 semesters of prep courses alone and will take them 4-5 years for a two-year degree. Along with the free PERT, SAT, and ACT testing preparation, study guides and tutoring, complimentary breakfast and lunch during tutoring sessions, scientific calculators, up to five free college books for their first semester of college, gas cards, paid college application costs, and ACT/SAT waivers. Our high school program will build critical thinking skills for our students' future higher education and post-high-school career endeavors.

Program Goals

·         Moving our students to pre-pandemic levels and leaving the learning loss in the rearview mirror by utilizing evidence-based, comprehensive, intensive outside-the-school-day learning opportunities for students by providing in-person and virtual tutoring services.

·         Promoting equity by making programs more accessible by providing content in sync with student needs and purposefully designing out-of-school-time programs to meet our students' specific and diverse needs.

·         Providing books to underserved students to support literacy to combat learning gaps due to post-pandemic education slides.

·         Providing books to schools to build classroom libraries and supporting literacy programs to combat learning gaps due to post-pandemic education slides.

·         Aligning program content and staffing with student interests and needs.

·         Providing consistent and personalized high-impact and high-dosage (offered three or more days of the week) tutoring to struggling, underserved students.

·         Creating a College-Going Culture, which refers to the environment, attitudes, and practices in schools and communities that encourage students and families to obtain the information, tools, and perspective to enhance access to and success in post-secondary education.

·         Engaging in Career-Aligned Educational Activities, which align career aspirations and educational programming that most efficiently prepares students for post-secondary goals.

·         Advising students on college and career choices while promoting their overall physical, intellectual, emotional, and social well-being.

·         Providing PERT, SAT, and ACT test preparation, including study guides, online access, and tutoring.

·         Ensuring all high school students of every race, religion, gender, sexual orientation, and socioeconomic level have accurate information, tools, knowledge, and opportunities to attend the country's best colleges.