CLiF offers a unique grant opportunity to help strengthen relationships and spark engagement within communities across Vermont and New Hampshire. Learn more about the Community Building grants we designed to achieve this goal by using reading and writing to bring people together.
Coming out of the pandemic, we are eager to offer ways to help build bridges and bring people together in ways that feel safe, meaningful, and educational. For 2023, the Community Building grants offer grantees the option to select from different opportunities that use reading and writing to connect kids to their communities while inspiring a love of literacy:
1000 Books Before Kindergarten – includes a CLiF presenter visit, an onsite library, and a two book giveaway. Target audience is ages 0-5 and their caregivers.
Family Engagement – includes a CLiF presenter, book giveaway, literacy workshop, and/or reimbursement for food/supplies at an event of your design to engage with children and their families around literacy. Maximum grant of $1000.
Design your own! What project will bring your students into contact with their community with literacy as an engagement point? What about re-connecting with an audience that has been out of touch due to the pandemic? How about multi-cultural programming to bring people together and enhance understanding of each other? Are there inclusive ways to serve your community around reading and writing that could use CLiF’s support? Maximum grant of $1000.
Eligibility
An organization, program, or facility must meet these requirements to apply for this year’s Community Building Grant:
Community/nonprofit organizations, youth-serving programs, libraries, or schools located in New Hampshire or Vermont.
Your project must serve a community with at least 35% of students qualifying for free/reduced lunch. Your application must show how you will partner with CLiF’s target audience of children ages 0-12 in under-resourced or under-represented communities.
At least 30 kids must participate in the program, either virtually or in-person.
Organizations with an enthusiastic and organized coordinator willing to collaborate with CLiF on planning, organizing, and communicating about your project.
Goals of the Community Building Grants
Build empathy for others by connecting with new groups
Create excitement around sharing books and writing
Inspire students and adults to read and write for pleasure
Encourage an appreciation for similarities and differences
Support all kinds of young readers and writers
Ensure children have high-quality books of their own at home
Engage parents/caregivers and encourage reading and writing at home
How CLiF Will Select Grant Recipients
Criteria include:
Demonstrated need and excitement
Enthusiasm, creativity, and collaboration exhibited by the partners
Clear demonstration of how this grant will benefit students and their communities
Because of the nature of this grant, we are looking for partners who can act quickly and implement activities for Spring 2023. Applications were due on March 1, 2023. Applicants will be notified if they received a grant by March 13, 2023. Grant funds must be spent by June 30, 2023 but it is okay to have activities/events happen in the summer.
As we celebrated our wider national community this July 4, CLiF wanted to share an example of “community literacy.” Spotlight on Morrisville, VT. CLiF first visited Morrisville in Summer 2015 when the Morristown After School Program (MASP) applied for the Summer Readers program. MASP participants have developed a relationship with David Martin over the past three … Continued
Amelia Opsahl, a Keene, New Hampshire high school student, founded Reading on the Road, an initiative to put books on school buses and ensure all kids have access to books. CLiF donated books for the program, and we talked to Amelia about the difference she and her partners have already made for kids in her … Continued
I received a letter – a handwritten card with the inside and back filled with news. It is a bit sad that this is such a remarkable event. We received lots of holiday cards, but they were either picture cards or typed and copied updates. I wish we all had more time for this personal and … Continued