Education

The Education Program has been a cornerstone of our grantmaking since the Fry Foundation's inception. Our interests in education focus on increasing the content knowledge of teachers, improving the quality and effectiveness of teaching in classrooms, and developing highly trained principals for service in public education.

We are committed to increasing the academic achievement of low-income students in Chicago public schools. Teacher professional development, principal preparation programs, and rigorous academic enrichment programs are among the activities we fund to support this goal. The Foundation also considers grant requests for policy advocacy when the connection to academic achievement is clear.

We give priority to programs that measure improvements to academic achievement and instructional quality. The Foundation encourages proposals that include efforts to enhance the quality of programs. These efforts might include professional development for program staff, incorporating new program elements, or the development of evaluation tools, among others. While the Foundation supports programs directed at students and teachers from kindergarten through 12th grade, we give priority to programs working at the high school level.

We generally do not fund unsolicited proposals from individual schools. On occasion, the Foundation will solicit proposals from individual schools for programs that demonstrate exemplary success or a promising innovation in one of the Foundation's priority areas. In soliciting proposals from individual schools, we look for: a record of strong academic performance among students; a focus on improving academic achievement; and indicators that the work funded by the grant will contribute valuable lessons and strategies that can be adopted by other schools. After an initial year of funding, schools may be required to develop plans for making the lessons learned under the grant available to other schools.