UVWS Receives Grant from Mascoma Bank

Thanks to the leadership and passion of Grade 6 Teacher Devon Abbey, a recent $2,500 grant from Mascoma Bank is expanding the UVWS library. We are grateful for Mascoma Bank’s support of our mission to prepare students for a changing world. The grant is earmarked for books that center themes of diversity, equity, and inclusion for Nursery through Grade 8 students.  
 

As Ms. Abbey wrote in the grant application:  

“A grant like this will give us an amazing start in completely revamping and modernizing our class libraries, and providing us the ability to cultivate a love of reading, as well as the empathy and understanding that comes with reading books with diverse characters. 

I have lots of titles in mind of course! But I'd like to purchase new class novel sets to continue our important diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) work as a class community. So far this year the Grade 6 students have read Seedfolks and Home of the Brave, addressing issues of race, ethnicity, immigration, and refugees. Before securing this grant, I was only able to do this work because I borrowed the books from another teacher at a different school.” 

Ms. Abbey will be coordinating with other teachers to select books for students at varying reading levels. You can read more about her work and how UVWS incorporates diversity into the classroom here: https://www.uvws.org/news/diversity-in-the-classroom