UW News

July 21, 2005

Microsoft grant to UW, others, will help K12 teachers

Expanding connections and resources for new K12 teachers is at the heart of a two-year, $500,000 grant from Microsoft that the UW will share with three other universities, partnering with public school districts.

The UW will receive about $100,000 over the two-year period through Microsoft’s to the National Commission on Teaching and America’s Future, the commission announced recently. The money will go to scale up its Teachers Learning in Networked Communities project, which provides online communities that support and offer professional development for teachers from their preparation programs through the certification process.

The project will provide means for facilitated online discussions, individual and group mentoring and a searchable database of education resources. The project has the goals of improving teacher retention and growing greater partnerships within and across schools and communities. The grant adds the UW and three other institutions partnering with school districts to four such pre-existing partnerships. The grants are part of Microsoft’s US Partners in Learning initiative. For more information about the initiative, visit online at www.microsoft.com/education. For more information about the nonprofit National Commission on Teaching and America’s Learning, visit www.nctaf.org.