Foundation Grant to Help Mundelein’s Program

By Russell Lissau Daily Herald Staff Writer

Donations from a relatively new foundation will help fund educational and extracurricular efforts at Mundelein High School, officials have announced.

Six programs will share $2,700 in grants from the Mundelein High School Educational Foundation. It’s the first time the foundation, which was created last year, has handed out money.

According to foundation officials:

– The guidance department will receive $500 to send two students to the National Hispanic Institute Conference in Texas for leadership training.

– The business and media technology department will receive $500 so students can create a DVD yearbook.

-The social studies and business education departments will share $500 to create an investing club and fund student participation in a stock market competition.

– The language arts department will get $500 to buy multimedia equipment for classrooms.

– The math department will get $500 to purchase overhead graphing calculators for classrooms.

– The media center will get $200 to buy paperback books for a student book club.

The grants were funded by donations to the foundation. The organization was created to provide extra educational programs for students and encourage private donations to the financially struggling school.

Mundelein High has been running with multimillion-dollar deficits for years but balanced the budget for the 2005-06 term.

Officials have eliminated programs, cut staff, increased class sizes and made other changes to save money through the years.

The foundation will consider more grant requests later this year. Leaders are looking to fund projects in five specific areas: fine and performing arts; student leadership; math and science; technology; and outreach to unengaged students or parent awareness.