2008 Grant Recipients

The Park Slope Civic Council awarded 18 grants for 2007-8, totaling $9,878. The grants helped fund projects at schools, charities, cultural institutions, and other organizations at work in Park Slope.

Park Slope Geriatric Day Center: Early Memory Loss Program. The grant will buy kits, tools and supplies for the Center’s clients, including its Early Memory Loss group, who will build doll houses that will be donated to children’s programs in Park Slope.

Groundswell Community Mural Project: Department of Environmental Protection Water Mural. In partnership with the Garden of Union and the Department of Environmental Protection, the Groundswell Summer Leadership Institute will create a large-scale mural exploring the water cycle and the importance of green spaces in New York City on the site of the new community garden planned for the water substation at 4th Avenue and Sackett Street.

Spoke the Hub: Miles of Tiles Continuing Mosaic Project. The grant will help buy material that people of all ages will use to re-create mosaics lost in the renovation and expansion of this multifaceted neighborhood arts center.

Reel Works Teen Filmmaking: Friday Movie Night at Reel Works. This teen-curated series exposes young filmmakers to classics to inspire their own creative cinematic journeys. Funding will be used to purchase a movie screen, speaker set, and DVD player.

P.S. 321: Adopt-A-Tree-Well. P.S. 321 classes will care for trees around the edges of the school, encouraging children to appreciate the environment in their own front yard. Children, parents, and staff will benefit from the improved aesthetics of the trees in their environment. Consultants from Trees NYC will teach the children how to care for the trees. Funds will be used to purchase gardening tools for the project.

M.S. 447 Math and Science Exploratory School: School-Wide Recycling Program. Although it’s the law, few New York City public schools actually recycle. Our grant will help launch a school-wide recycling program at MS 447, administered by students and led by a teacher who successfully implemented a similar program at a Bedford Stuyvesant middle school. Recycling will be integrated into the 6th-grade math curriculum.

Brooklyn Conservatory of Music: Civic Sounds. Our grant will help fund the Civic Sounds summer community concert series, Friday afternoons outside the Conservatory. Genres will include Jazz, Classical, World, Rock, Pop, and R&B.

Old First Reformed Church: Club Loco. The year-old club, founded with the help of PSCC’s first Community Builder grant, provides a venue for teen musicians and a place for teens aged 14-20 to hang out in a safe environment away from parents and authority figures. Our grant will be used to increase Club Loco’s visibility and to increase the diversity of the teens that come to the club.

Brooklyn Arts Exchange: Opportunities for Teens in the Arts. The BAX Teen Arts Conference is celebrating 10 years of development and support for young artists. Funding will help expand BAX’s Higher Education Opportunities in the Arts program, which offers teens insight into educational and vocational trajectories in dance and theatre.

Old Stone House: Education Program. The Old Stone House is participating in a National Endowment for the Humanities grant to examine the African and African-American experience in New York in the years 1660-1875. Our grant will help develop a drama-based curriculum for 7th graders exploring that subject.

Council on the Environment of New York City: Park Slope Computer and Recycling Day. Our grant will help the Council on the Environment conduct an electronic recycling day coinciding with our Spring Clean Sweep on April 19. Electronic gear will be given to Per Scholas, which reconditions usable equipment and recycles the rest in an environmentally responsible manner.

Park Slope Senior Center: Park Slope Senior Center’s “Recipes from the Heart.” The Center’s creative writing class will create a cookbook melding memories and cultures through the sharing of traditional recipes. Our grant will help with printing costs.

The Garden of Union: Sunday Afternoon Music Series. Our grant will help fund live musical performances in the community garden on Union Street between 4th and 5th Avenues (tentative dates: May 31, June 21, and October 19).

P.S. 39: P.S. 39 Parent Involvement. Our grant will help pay for the printing of handouts at a series of parent involvement workshops ranging in subject matter from “How to Better Communicate With Your Child” to “Discipline without Punishment.”

Park Slope Christian Help: Soup Kitchen and Pantry Program. Funding will be used to purchase essential supplies for the CHIPS soup kitchen, an honored Park Slope Institution serving 200-300 meals a day.

The Green-Wood Historic Fund: Serving Educators to Better Serve Students. Our grant will help pay for lesson plans and guides for neighborhood elementary schools that come to the cemetery for tours and instruction from the cemetery’s Director of School Programs.

Prospect Park Alliance: Bartel-Pritchard Square Planting Project. With help from our grant, an invasive species, Japanese Barberry, will be replaced with native shrubs. The plantings will also beautify the square and its World War I monument.

M.S. 51: The Partnership Gardens Program. Our grant will be used to purchase plants and gardening materials for four areas at M.S. 51 and four areas in J.J. Byrne Park that will be cared for by M.S. 51 students.

Members of the Grants Committee included: Chairperson Greg Sutton, Nathaniel Allman, David Alquist, Nelly Isaacson, Ann Kalkhoff, Robert Levine, Eric McClure and Lauri Schindler. Any community school or group is welcome to apply for a grant. The guidelines may be read on our web site, and downloadable applications for the 2008-9 cycle will be posted in the fall.