Bush Foundation Grants Focus on Children and Youth

The Bush Foundation, St. Paul, helped meet the needs of children and youth as part of its latest grant awards. The foundation's board of directors awarded grants of more than $10 million to 56 nonprofit organizations or programs in Minnesota, North Dakota and South Dakota on July 14.

The foundation's recent grants for youth-serving programs included $190,000 for the Greater Minneapolis Crisis Nursery's new South Minneapolis facility; $217,000 for Family and Children's Service, Minneapolis, to focus on violence prevention programs; and $369,982 for construction of a teen center on the Cheyenne River Reservation in Eagle Butte, S.D.

In the Twin Cities area, the foundation's grants to organizations serving youth included $110,000 to the Children's Law Center of Minnesota for the Ramsey County Guardianship Pilot Project, $60,000 to the Youth and Farm Market for a program to teach gardening and nutrition to immigrant children and $67,500 to the Greater Twin Cities Youth Symphonies as part of the foundation's Regional Arts Development Program (RADP), which provides operating support for mid-sized arts organizations.

The foundation also focused grants on early childhood education programs, including $318,798 to South Dakota State University at Brookings for the South Dakota Institute for Infant Toddler Care and Development and $625,366 to the State of North Dakota Department of Human Services to support the Child Development Successor Program. These grants are part of a 10-year effort by the foundation to create a network of educated trainers for those who care for children under the age of three. In Minnesota, the foundation gave $90,000 to Ready 4 K in St. Paul to work with Hmong parents on school readiness for their children.

Other highlights of the Bush Foundation's latest education funding included grants to colleges and school districts working to improve the student learning experience. A school district serving the Rosebud Sioux Reservation in St. Francis, S.D., received $100,000 to fund the first year of a project to improve high school completion. FUNdamentals Center for Science, Technology, Engineering and Math, Duluth, and the Twin Cities Housing Development Corporation, St. Paul, received grants to support the teaching of math and science to elementary-age children.

In higher education, the foundation supported faculty development at two tribal colleges in Montana: $150,000 to Salish Kootenai Community College in Pablo, Mont. and $90,000 to Fort Peck Community College in Poplar, Mont. The University of Minnesota received a grant of $300,000 to develop an integrated teaching, outreach and research program in ecosystem science and sustainability. And Augustana College in Sioux Falls, S.D., will receive a matching grant of $500,000 from the foundation at the completion of a campaign for a new campus center for visual arts.

The Bush Foundation also provided new funding to support arts and humanities, ecological health, and health and human services. Grant recipients included:

• Great American History Theater, Inc., $60,000 for the development of new plays.
     
• The Jazz Arts Group of Fargo-Moorhead, $50,670 to fund additional staff positions.
     
• Pine Ridge Reservation, S.D., $50,000 for a prairie restoration project involving teens.
     
• Regions Hospital, St. Paul, $70,000 to provide physical and mental health screenings for the Hmong refugees arriving from the Wat Tham Krabok camp in Thailand.
     
• The Rivers Council of Minnesota, Sauk Rapids, $175,000 to fund a coordinator for the river sentinel program to monitor the health of Minnesota rivers.

For a complete list of grants awarded by the Bush Foundations on July 14, visit the foundation's Web site. 

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