DESIGN FOR THE FUTURE: THE LANGBERG FOUNDATION'S PRIORITIES
The Langberg Foundation trustees and advisors have targeted specific areas in which the Foundation will either take initiative or focus funding. These areas include:
- The development of an Alternative University
- A Charter School Bank to provide financial services to assist Charter Schools with specific funding challenges
- A Development Consulting Service to assist groups creating new schools with the expertise to generate the necessary financial resources to support their efforts
- The Consulting Services Resource Pool - legal, accounting, architectural and other professional services made accessible to Charter Schools
- The Charter School Teacher Training Program - designed to assist teachers in the development of those skills and competencies required for success in a Charter School
- The creation of special seminars, workshops and symposia designed to bridge the gap between conventional public schools and Charter Schools
- A Summer Institutes to support Charter School teachers, staff and board members as they move into the next phase in the development of a successful Charter School
- A Charter School Advocacy Program to promote dialogue with School Board Associations, Teachers' Organizations and Foundation Trustees
- The Business of Schooling - seminars and workshops for trustees of smaller foundations to create a perspective for their financial support of education.
PROJECTS OF THE LANGBERG FOUNDATION
EDUCATION FOR MORAL COURAGE
One alternative educational model which the Langberg Foundation has developed and administered is Education for Moral Courage, which offers a curriculum that integrates academic pursuits with universal moral values such as caring, determination, flexibility, idealism/hope and reliability/trust. In support of this curriculum, the program also provides training for teachers and community members as ethnographers, helping them to transform the culture of their school and community to one that is congruent with the precepts being learned in the classroom. Although this program has been piloted with upper elementary students, it has the potential for application to people of any age.
The combination of a curriculum with the ethnographic study necessary to ensure that the curriculum is embedded in a school culture that is consistent with its precepts is powerful. When the third component, community, is added, this approach to education becomes universal.
HARMONY SCHOOL
The Langberg Foundation is working in partnership with the Our Musical Heritage, a foundation of the Denver Musicians Association, to create a charter school in the Denver metropolitan area that will provide a learning laboratory for bringing professional artists and musicians into the teaching profession via the alternative certification route.
The "Harmony School", the working title for this new charter school, will begin with students from the ages of three through ten, and the curriculum will be arts-focused, with particular attention to music as an integrating force for learning across conventional disciplines. The faculty will be comprised of three categories: master teachers, who will be continuing members of the Harmony School staff, professional artists and musicians, who will join the staff for the one year necessary for them to obtain their teaching licenses, and bridge-builder teachers from within the same school system, who will spend one year in Harmony and then return to their respective home schools. Click here to read more about Harmony School
GRANTMAKING
The LANGBERG FOUNDATION also engages in fundraising for and grantmaking to worthy alternative educational projects. To assure the most effective use of grant monies, the Trustees of the LANGBERG FOUNDATION work directly with each prospective grantee to learn more about their program and to assist in the development of their grant request. As the LANGBERG FOUNDATION community of grant recipients expands, they become part of the LANGBERG FOUNDATION network. Click here to read more about LANGBERG FOUNDATION grants
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