Helping America’s Schools

With the release of Waiting for Superman, people are looking at the American school system and asking what they can do to help. The good news is that there are a lot of wonderful organizations that have been working for years to improve American schools. Today, Tribal Truth is featuring several of our favorite educational organizations. Read more about them below, and check out their websites to donate and find volunteer opportunities in your community!

Time Warner Cable’s Connect a Million Minds: Together with the Coalition for Science After School, Pop!Tech, and FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology), Connect a Million Minds focuses its attention on getting kids interested in math and science. Since November 2009, Connect a Million Minds has committed $100 million cash towards math, engineering, and science programs for kids.

Bing Education: Bing Education will be donating $100,000 to one school and $50,000 to three additional schools as part of their Our School Needs contest. Teachers and principals can make their school eligible by submitting an essay about what the school needs and corresponding pictures. They can also strengthen their entry by including a video showing the school and its needs. Go to http://cdn.discoverbing.com/education/ourschoolneeds/docs/HowToKit.pdf for more details, and go to http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/09/16/josh-groban-bing-donate-instruments-to-school_n_720077.html to see Bing Education team up with singer Josh Groban for school music programs.

VH1’s Save the Music Foundation: VH1’s Save the Music Foundation partners with school districts, and they make sure that every school in the district has the resources to maintain music programs. Save the Music gives their partner schools $30,000 worth of musical instruments, and in return, the school districts commit to keeping up the programs, paying music teachers’ salaries, and making music classes part of the school’s daily schedule.

Donors Choose: Donors Choose has been featured before on Tribal Truth. On the Donors Choose website, teachers can submit their classroom projects and needs and how much they cost. Examples include textbooks, computers, printers, and an egg incubator for hatching chicken and duck eggs. Go to http://www.donorschoose.org/donors/search.html to view urgent classroom requests.