Julie Leeth (right) with CFO's Rural Schools Partnership presents a DVD copy of "Hats, Pies and Fiddles," as well as $100 check, to Sophia Greenwalt, organizer of Reeds Springs Middle School's Hat Day program.

If ever the character of an entire town could be summed up by one of its youngest citizens, Reeds Spring, Mo. is wonderfully represented by 13-year-old Sophia Greenwalt.

A 7th grader at Reeds Spring Middle School, Sophia has spent the last two school years orchestrating a monthly “Hat Day,” which has rallied her fellow students around philanthropy and community-building. Sophia put together a PowerPoint presentation and presented the idea to the school. The idea – in which students are allowed to wear any type of appropriate headwear one day a month (hats are usually against dress code) – is facilitated by the Reeds Spring School Foundation and supported by school administration, faculty and staff. It is truly a community effort.

“I just wanted to help people, and we never get to wear hats during school,” Sophia said. “I just thought it would be cool to have everyone take part in it.”

“Take part” is putting it mildly. Since September 2010 Hat Day has raised more than $13,000 for local charities, including the local Humane Society, Ozarks Honor Flight, Shop With a Cop and the school’s backpack program for students in need of food options at home.

On Friday, Jan. 13, Sophia was honored for her efforts at one of the school’s Character assemblies. The Reeds Spring School Foundation and the Community Foundation of the Ozarks’ Rural Schools Partnership presented her with a $100 grant to put towards a future Hat Day’s collection total. The school was also treated to a special screening of “Hats, Pies and Fiddles” a short film produced by the Rural Schools Partnership to help illustrate the importance of rural school foundations. Hat Day is one of the film’s case studies, and Sophia one of its stars.

“Hats, Pie and Fiddles” is just one element of a joint effort between the RSP and the Rural School and Community Trust’s Center for Midwestern Initiatives to help promote rural school foundations as vital parts of a school district’s (and a community’s) financial and social support system.

Sophia’s mother, Nettie Greenwalt, was in attendance at the surprise check presentation, and said the ceremonial big check is now hanging on Sophia’s wall. She also said the school foundation and administration, led by Table Rock Lake Community Foundation and Reeds Spring Schools Director of Public Relations Jim Holt, has been instrumental in the Hat Day program’s success.

“I want to give a whole lot of credit to Mr. (Jim) Holt,” Nettie Greenwalt said. “He is Sophia’s biggest supporter.”

About the Rural Schools Foundation Toolkit

As Sophia’s story helps illustrate, education is the lifeblood of small communities, and rural citizens must do all they can to support their schools, teachers, and students. Establishing an active and effective school foundation is an important step in ensuring rural school sustainability. To this end, the Community Foundation of the Ozarks’ Rural School Partnership and The Rural School and Community Trust’s Center for Midwestern Initiatives have collaborated on the development of a comprehensive rural school foundation toolkit.

The toolkit has three primary features:

1. The film Hats, Pies, and Fiddles explores how three small-town school foundations engage students, teachers, and donors in creating a culture of school-centered philanthropy. This ten-minute film was shot by Missouri filmmaker Brandon Goodwin and highlights efforts in Reeds Spring and Alton, Missouri, and Fox (Rural Special School), Arkansas. DVDs are available upon request and the film is featured online.

2. A booklet, Building Rural School Foundations: A Blueprint for Stronger Rural Communities, has been published and is available online and in print. Produced by Missouri graphic artist and photographer Aaron Scott, the booklet provides action steps for establishing a rural school foundation as well as a donors’ guide on how to make charitable contributions. In addition, school foundation success stories showcase the Ozarks communities of Conway, Bradleyville, Chadwick, and Hartville, along with Wessington Springs, South Dakota.

3. A School Foundation Building website has been constructed in conjunction with the Center for Midwestern Initiatives. The site includes the aforementioned film and booklet, and it provides current examples and stories of the good and important work being done by school foundations from throughout the Midwest. The site’s blog provides readers with an opportunity to share their personal stories and submit materials to the site. Click here to view the CMI’s school foundation building page.

These efforts have been made possible by funding from the Philanthropy Initiative, a capacity building grant program of the Community Foundation of the Ozarks.

Pictured: Carol Silvey with the Community Foundation of the Ozarks, far left; fourth grade teacher Lacy Reynolds; and far right, school principal Jennifer Douglas and Kelly Wardle. They are pictured with students from Mrs. Reynolds’s fourth grade class at a recent school assembly.

A primary objective of the community Foundation of the Ozarks’ Ozarks Teacher Corps is to introduce members to opportunities for garnering philanthropic resources for rural schools. Drury University participant Kelly Wardle, of Willow Springs, has taken advantage of this opportunity.

Wardle’s knowledge paid dividends recently when Carol Silvey, senior associate for advancement with the Community Foundation of the Ozarks, presented a $2,000 Student Conservation Grant to Willow Springs Elementary School. Wardle learned about the grant opportunity through the Ozarks Teacher Corps and had the opportunity to visit several rural schools and see the impact such grants have made. Because only certified teachers are eligible to apply for the grant, and Wardle is currently a student teacher, Kelly partnered with Willow Springs fourth-grade teacher Lacy Reynolds. The grant paperwork was filled out with the help of Reynolds’ fourth-grade class.

The $2,000 in funds will go toward improvements to the outdoor classroom at the elementary school, adding a conservation area. It will include picnic tables, sensory tables, a sand area and a small orchard with six to eight apple trees and four pear trees. Produce from the school’s orchards will be sold at the annual community festival. The project will also builds a new partnership between the Willow Springs School Foundation and the Willow Springs Art Council.

The students of Willow Springs Elementary School will be at the heart of the project. Wardle said students will be taste-testing apples to decide which trees would be best. Once they decide on the trees, they will receive information on raising apple and pear trees from John Avery Jr. with the Missouri State University Fruit Experiment Station in Mountain Grove. The trees will be planted this spring.

The Student Conservation Grants are funded through the Community Foundation of the Ozarks’ Rural Schools Conservation Fund and the Missouri Conservation Heritage Foundation Grant Fund. Willow Springs is a member of the CFO’s Rural Schools Partnership, which focuses on sustaining rural schools as anchors of their communities

Albert Bryant is a first-year mathematics teacher in tiny Everton, Missouri, his hometown.  A graduate of Drury University, Albert was in the inaugural class of the Ozarks Teacher Corps, an effort dedicated to encouraging outstanding teacher prospects to return to their rural home communities as teachers.  The Ozarks Teacher Corps is funded by the Community Foundation of the Ozarks’ Rural School Partnership and provides participants with a $4,000 per year scholarship, seminars on rural education issues, and a variety of networking opportunities.

Albert is one of six spring 2011 graduates who were hired for rural Ozarks’ classrooms.  One other student was dismissed from the program for non-participation, and another returned their scholarship after accepting a position in an urban school.  Albert and his colleagues have been featured in Education Week, USA Today, School and Community, and they have become ambassadors for rural schools.  The program currently includes 25 future teachers from Drury, Missouri State University, and Evangel University.  The second class is comprised both of December ’11 and May ’12 graduates.

As an Ozarks Teacher Corps alum, Albert was eligible for and received a place-based education classroom grant from the Community Foundation of the Ozarks.  His project, setting up a student-run computer repair service for folks in Everton, exemplifies the best of place-based principles.  Not only do Albert’s students receive hands-on experiences in applying classroom learning, and they are providing a service in a small town where none previously existed.

Albert’s “pre-term” and “mid-term” are both available in this online feature.  The short film was shot prior to the fall term, and Albert discusses his rationale for returning to his hometown and what he hopes to accomplish.  The essay below was written in December, and in it he assesses his year to date.

The Mid-Term:  A Personal Essay

My name is Albert Bryant. I am a graduate of the Ozarks Teacher Corps and have been serving at Everton High School in Everton, Missouri as a mathematics teacher for grades 8-12. This is my first year teaching, and I must say, it has been one roller coaster of a ride. Over the past 3 months I’ve felt many emotions, learned many things, taught many things and overall, lived life to the fullest. They say teaching is difficult but I never realized just how difficult until I actually did it.
Everton is a small rural community located in the heart of the Great Plains. I teach at Everton because I love the community, and I see the potential that the community has to achieve great things. As a new teacher I am learning about the teaching profession, but I have already started to influence those around me. In our staff book study there has already been talk about changing the attitude of students who view the small community negatively. Alongside learning to teach, I have also been working directly with a couple of great mentors.

One of the great needs in our community is technology. With me as a starting point (and my mentors’ guidance) we have devised a plan to help meet the needs of the community, school, and students. Our plan is to harness the power of the small group for these goals: to save the community money, teach the students valuable skills, and benefit the school technologically. So as a new teacher, I am very busy.

In short I have been building relationships, learning to teach, teaching mathematics, and busy planning! I enjoy teaching students new skills, and will also enjoy giving back to the community where I came from. I hope to enrich and build the community up. To quote Tom Petty, I’m learning to fly!

(Pictured left to right: Terrill Story, Ramona Rhinhart, YEP board members, and Community Foundation board members: Kelly Money, Errica Hartley, Lindsey Pantaleo, Jenna Davis, & Jon Hartley.)

Recently, the St. James Area Community Foundation granted $2,000 to the St. James Youth Empowerment Program (YEP) to help them with their Firehouse Coffee Shop. St. James YEP’s Firehouse Coffee Shop has emerged from a place-based grant from the Rural School Partnership’s Coover grants program.

The partnership between the local community foundation and the school-centered YEP program is exactly the kind of collaboration that is needed to strengthen school and community in small towns.  Congratulations to everyone in St. James for this good work.

Also in the last few weeks, the St. James Area CF threw a New Year’s Eve Gala at Matt’s Steakhouse, where they raised more than $10,000, as posted on their Facebook page.

If you would like to learn more about the Firehouse Coffee Shop project, go to the St. James YEP link at http://yep.groupspot.net/St.-James/Default.aspx.

A very good tool for giving is the IRA Rollover opportunity, available to donors age 70-and-a-half and older, who have an IRA account. Eligible donors may donate up to $100,000 annually from their IRA to any charitable organization. Small gifts are permissible, too; and you should note that many people have the ability to make gifts in the $500 to $5,000 range from their IRAs.

Click here to download a PDF of our helpful IRA Rollover brochure.

Click here for some more specifics on IRA rollovers, the current provisions for which are effective through December 31, 2011.

Also, with December 31 fast approaching, many donors are making contributions to school foundations, funds or favorite agencies before the end of the calendar year. If you choose to contribute to a fund managed by CFO, you can do so online via our donations portal (PLEASE LIST THE NAME OF YOUR FUND OR AGENCY IN THE DESCRIPTION FIELD WHEN YOU GET TO IT), or you can call our offices at (417) 864-6199. If you choose to mail a check to CFO (P.O. Box 8960, Springfield MO, 65801), be advised that it must be POSTMARKED no later than December 31, 2011.

The scholarship was established by bequest as a direct request from Mrs. Slusher, who died on Aug. 30, 2011. Mrs. Slusher chaired the Roy W. Slusher Foundation board from its inception until her death, and was actively involved in overseeing the distribution of nearly $5 million from the foundation to non-profit organizations in Taney and Stone counties.

“Nora was well known in this area for her annual gifting of a new pair of shoes for all Bradleyville students,” said Mitch Holmes, a financial adviser with Edward D. Jones and board member for the Community Foundation of Taney County. “She never had children of her own but enjoyed giving to those in need. This scholarship helps ensure her legacy continues.”

Applications for the scholarship will be available for download at cfozarks.org/scholarships beginning Feb. 1, 2012, with announcement at Forsyth and Bradleyville graduation exercises in spring 2012.

Criteria for the scholarship include ranking in the top half of the graduating class, demonstration of good citizenship, financial need, and plans to attend a two- or four-year college, university or trade school. Preference will be given to students with ACT scores lower than 25 and GPAs lower than 3.5. The exact number of scholarships granted, and the dollar amounts, have yet to be determined. The scholarships will be non-renewable.

Mrs. Slusher was born on October 14, 1915 in Danbury, Neb., and was raised on a farm. After working in business in Denver, Colo., she married Roy Slusher in 1966. They moved to Forsyth, Mo., in 1969.

The Nora Slusher Scholarship Fund is a component fund of The Community Foundation of Taney County, an affiliate of the Community Foundation of the Ozarks.

Browse other CFO-administered scholarships

The Student Conservation grants are funded through the Community Foundation of the Ozarks’ Rural Schools Conservation Fund and the Missouri Conservation Heritage Foundation Grant Fund. Recipient districts are partners of the CFO’s Rural Schools Partnership, which focuses on sustaining rural schools as anchors of their communities.

“The conservation/environmental grants are selected on the basis of student involvement and community impact,” said Julie Leeth, Rural Schools Coordinator and Executive Vice President of the Community Foundation of the Ozarks. “All of the selected projects will enhance the education of the involved students and at the same time better the community at large, which is the essence of place-based education.”

To learn about RSP’s other grant opportunities, click here.

The Student Conservation grants were awarded to the following student-led projects:

• $1,325 to Ozark Upper Elementary School for maintenance of the campus’s outdoor classrooms and to build a network of trails between them, as well as the completion of a Native Missouri Plant Garden.

• $1,573 to Stockton High School’s Stockton Teen Empowerment Project (STEP) to help create, maintain and publicize a trail network within the community and in Stockton State Park. Benches made of recycled materials will be part of the project.

• $1,235 to Galena High School for a collaborative effort to create a small food plot on vacant land, as well as utilization cages and trail cameras, that will allow students to study and observe local wildlife.

• $1,848 to the Hartville R-II School District to help transform a vacant area on the school’s campus into a native flower and vegetable garden, with a goal of eventually contributing to the district food service’s Garden to School program.

• $1,983 to the Ozark County Youth Empowerment Project (YEP) for expansion of the group’s citywide recycling program in Gainesville. Funds will be used to purchase more receptacles to place in school and public facilities, as well as extra bags and plastic liners.

• $2,000 to Willow Springs Elementary School to help improve the district’s outdoor classroom, including a sand sensory box for science classes, picnic tables and the planting of fruit orchard for fourth graders, with produce eventually being sold at community events.

The Ozark County Youth Empowerment Project and Stockton Teen Empowerment Project are two of 35 chapters of the CFO’s Youth Empowerment Project, which encourages youth philanthropy through education, service learning, grantmaking and fundraising.

Artist Kate Baird takes suggestions from Grandy eighth graders during the "peom" segment of their Placeworks lesson.

On a glorious recent fall day I had the privilege of tagging along with CFO’s Placeworks traveling artist Kate Baird as she visited the East Newton school district in Newton County, specifically working with eighth graders at K-8 schools in Stella and Granby (it’s a spread-out district; all students end up at East Newton High School, also in Granby). We wanted to get the essence of what the program is, and how kids respond. It turned into one of the most fun days of work you can possibly have.

First, a bit about Placeworks:

The program is in its second year of bringing hands-on, cross-curricular arts lessons to students in rural areas. Baird, a former teaching artist at the Guggenheim Museum, the Kentler International Drawing Space and the Rubin Museum of Art in New York, visits classrooms in districts with ties to the RSP program free of charge (contact Julie Leeth to learn more about how and if your district can qualify). Using input from teachers, she develops a lesson that combines artistic concepts with other areas of study. The result is an interactive, interdisciplinary session that kids will remember.

For example, across the East Newton district, students are focusing on the Civil War and its 150th anniversary in a variety of ways and classes. This was Baird’s “starting point” for the lesson.

Fortunately, the Civil War was an interesting period not only for history, but for art. Photography was a new invention in the 1860s, and the Civil War was the first time anyone had ever seen real images from the battlefield. However, reproducibility, quality and convenience were still problems with cameras that weighed hundreds of pounds and printed on tin, so drawings and renderings of battles were still far more common in the newspapers.

So Baird handed out two prints: One of a famous photograph by Matthew Brady, the other a sketch drawing from the time by artist Alfred Waud. Students were asked to compare and contrast the images through both rapid free-association and a longer, more detailed study.They wrote their thoughts down on pieces of paper, which Baird collected.

A few things jumped out (according to the kids):

– The photograph was blurry where objects were moving, while the drawing was (impossibly) crystal clear. The quality of old photography and clarity from distance was discussed.

– Students talked about what they thought the figures in the photos were doing. One looked like a general, ahorse with his arm raised. Many others looked wounded, or were struggling with their shoes.

– The fact that you couldn’t see the trunks of the trees in the background of the photo indicated it was taken on a hill.

In a final exercise, the words students were asked to write down on a piece of paper upon first seeing the artworks were arranged in poem form, with input from the group on when to break a line; it was like improv with words and pictures. For example:

“Sad.” “Depressing.” “Sad.”
“Horse.” “Tree.” “Sky.” “Sad.”
“War.”

This is just one example of a Placeworks Arts Initiative class; every school, lesson and session is different. Click here to learn more about the program, which has closed its latest round of applications but will be accepting new ones soon.

With further questions, please contact Julie Leeth at (417) 864-6199, or e-mail jleeth@cfozarks.org.

This webinar is being presented by Bolivar elementary teachers Kayla King, Joelle Smith, and Janet Tweedy who spent part of their summer vacations attending a week-long cooperative learning conference in Orlando, Fla., through one of 11 national Fund for Teachers Fellowships awarded for 2011.  These awards are made in conjunction with The Rural School and Community Trust.

This webinar is open to all teachers and administrators in the Rural Schools Partnership network and mandatory for Ozarks Teacher Corps members.

Space is limited! Reserve your seat now at https://www3.gotomeeting.com/register/866423294.

After registering you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the Webinar.