DARING Innovation Grants

2022-2023 DARING Innovation Grant Recipients

The District 128 Foundation for Learning continued its mission to enhance and enrich learning in Community High School District 128 by awarding 10 DARING Innovation Grants totaling $22,678.77 to Libertyville High School and Vernon Hills High School teachers. The 2022-2023 grant winners were announced and will be celebrated during the 1-28 Day of Giving on January 28, 2023. This year's grants brought the number of grants awarded by the Foundation since 2008 to 192 and the total dollars funded to $305,515.10. The Foundation has also funded $128,600 for project funding to LHS and VHHS. Total funding for Innovation Grants and Projects is $434,125.10. 

In addition to funding DARING Innovation Grants and Projects, the Foundation has funded $117,316.15 for the Students In Need project since 2015. To date, the Foundation has given LHS and VHHS $551,441.25 in funding for the initiatives listed above.

The 2022-2023 DARING Innovation Grants Winners

Assistive Technology Lending Closet - An Assistive Technology lending closet helps students who are experiencing barriers become more successful at educational tasks: reading, writing, communication, and executive function skills. By trialing tools in the lending closet, students are able to test which tools will improve their educational abilities. $2,500 - LHS, VHHS, Transition - Special Services - Marci Simmons, Kimberly Weinberg, Jana Kohn, Jennifer Brandt

BioMechanical Engineering - Where Physics and Life Collide - The physics of how we move is a project that will allow us to enable students to see physics in their everyday lives. Students are able to analyze the physics behind the way they move using force platforms and motion sensors. Students will collect real data created by themselves and their classmates moving and applying force to objects. $2,500 - VHHS - Science - Nicole Collins, Alicia Harris, Neal Hausmann

Bringing the Fine Arts to Life in Virtual Reality - Computer Science + Fine Art students will work together to create a virtual world that allows friends and family to view the various VHHS productions from home in a 3D virtual surround setting. $2,200 - VHHS - Mathematics, Arts - Adam Lueken, Andrew Russell

Celebrating Jennifer Doudna - The project provides a class set of Jennifer Doudna’s book, A Crack in Creation: Gene Editing and the Unthinkable Power to Control Evolution. Students will learn about the mechanism behind CRISPR - a technology Doudna helped create. Students will look at CRISPR through a global lens and discuss the impact such a technology has on the various realities and inequalities in the world. $2,200 - VHHS - Science - Chris Wolf

Conversations Beyond the Classroom - Spanish III Honors students apply their growing conversation skills to engage and converse with native Spanish speakers. Each student will connect with a native Spanish speaker through an online platform designed to join language learners with trained conversation partners. $1,890 - VHHS - World Languages - Nora Kostro, Michelle Bastiani, Kim Raciak

Enhancing Earth Science, Chemistry and Physics Concepts for Newcomer English Learners - This project allows groups of students to build their own custom roller coasters and to calculate the potential and kinetic energy of the cars. The roller coaster kits encourage students to collaborate, build, and test together. Also, these lab kits provide a hands-on experience that maximizes student exposure to the content. $2,488.77 - VHHS - Science, World Languages - Elissa Gong

Literacy and Math Through Service Learning - Students utilize functional literacy skills, math application skills, and social skills to implement service learning projects. Students research community organizations, identify a problem the organization is working to solve, and the students provide support. In this service learning project, students learn the importance of giving back to the world around them. $2,500 - LHS - Special Services - Kim Jansen, Jenna Manz, Meghan Ahern, Simone Oslage, Amanda Comeaux

Robotics in AP CSP - AP Computer Science Principles is an introduction to robotics and programming robots to do various skills including: collision avoidance, sensing various colors/sounds/lights, utilizing motors, and using code to solve a variety of problems. $2,400 - LHS, VHHS - Mathematics - Adam Lueken, Ryan Feeney, Teresa Elmore, Christine Falkstrom

Student Inquiry in Roller Coaster Building for Newcomer English Learners - This project allows students to engage in learning by designing and building roller coasters and, once constructed, the physics sensors enable students to record data and calculate the changes in energy. $2,500 - VHHS - Science, World Languages - Elissa Gong

Subtractive Color Theory - Hands-On - Students will be able to manipulate different color transparent tiles on a board with a backlight. This will give students a hands-on experience where they can investigate the effects that certain colors of light have on each other, differentiate between pigment color mixing they see in art and light color mixing in physics, understand reflection vs absorption of light in a way they previously could only see through a video or online simulation. $1,500 - VHHS - Science - Alicia Harris, Neal Hausmann

Total 2022-2023 Grants Funded as of December 19, 2022 - $22,678.77

Founded in 2007, the Foundation for Learning was established to enhance and enrich the instructional program in District 128 by obtaining resources through community partnerships.