Architects and industry allies provide over $58,000 in grants

Boston, Massachusetts, December 6, 2004 — Twelve public-education programs throughout Massachusetts are receiving a total of $58,751 in grants this month from the Boston Foundation for Architecture.

The Foundation's trustees, who evaluated the three dozen grant applications received this year, include architects, engineers, developers, educators, civic leaders, and other allies. In addition, the decision-making process again included the participation of two representatives of The Engineering Center Education Trust (TECET), which annually contributes significant funding for these grants, each of which helps underwrite community-based public-education programs that focus on elevating public awareness of and participation in the planning, design, and construction of our communities.

This year, the Foundation — created by the BSA in 1984 and now in its sixth annual collaboration with TECET — received proposals from schoolteachers, institutions, and other individual and organizational applicants throughout the state. This year's grants are summarized here and include the names and telephone numbers/e-mail addresses of the individuals to call/write in each case for additional details.

Wentworth Institute of Technology — $6,500 to support a three-week summer program in Boston designed to introduce 13-15-year-old students to the basic principals of architecture and planning in our local context (Sean Bender, 617-989-4992 / benders@wit.edu).

Umana Barnes Middle School, East Boston — $2,000 to support "East Boston Celebrates 30 Years of Art and Architecture", a traveling art exhibit showcasing student work of the past three decades including dioramas, paintings, prints, and 3D scenes of historic East Boston buildings/architecture (Rita Sara Cohen, 617-635-8481 / sareet1@aol.com).

Tufts University Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering — $5,000 to support an effort by Tuft's students to prepare buildable model bridges, plans, and classroom presentation materials for use in grade-school classrooms (Brian Brenner, 617-627-3761 / brian.brenner@tufts.edu).

The House of the Seven Gables — $4,000 to support the development of a curriculum for grades 4-7 students on first and second period American architecture and design using The House of the Seven Gables site in Salem (Robin Cohn, 978-744-0991x107 / rcohn@7gables.org).

Southeastern Massachusetts Art Collaborative — $5,000 to support a professional-development training program and follow-up classroom teaching for K-8 Attleboro teachers and students engaged in interdisciplinary architecture and design activities based on an existing curriculum that uses the environments of their own school buildings and landscapes as subjects for study (Sherye Weisz, 508-222-8484 / smarts@ici.net).

Haverhill Historical Society — $2,500 to support the creation of two versions of an architectural walking tour for the Washington Street Historic District including the development of a curriculum with video and CD archives (Joanne Sullivan, 978-374-4626 / jsullivan@haverhillhistory.org).

Gretchen Schneider — $3,000 to support this architect/educator's initiative to engage inner-city youth and area architecture students in the creation of a series of 100 different postcards depicting the diversity of Boston's 'real places' (Gretchen Schneider, 617-686-4362 / schneiderstudio@yahoo.com).

Girls Incorporated of Worcester — $4,251 to support a program that will introduce 40 girls to architecture and construction and to help them acquire skills in math, engineering, and the design processes as they participate in hands-on building projects and demonstrate the vast career possibilities for women in design and construction (Anne Sadick, 508-755-6455x21 / asadick.worcester@girls-inc.org).

Citizen Schools — $7,500 to support the "Kids Design" initiative that includes hands-on apprenticeships that will introduce Boston middle-school students to architecture and result in projects such as tours of historic neighborhoods and new designs for public spaces (Jennifer Lacano, 617-695-2300x113 / jenniferlacano@citizenschools.org).

Center for Technology + Environment — $7,500 to support an interactive, outdoor environmental technologies laboratory and demonstration garden for Somerville High School students with corresponding science and media curricula (Chris Reed, 617-832-0660 / cr@stoss.net).

Boston By Foot — $4,000 to develop a 50-minute PowerPoint presentation on "Boston's Buildings and Bridges" for elementary schoolchildren (Polly Flansburgh, 617-367-2345 / bbfoot@bostonbyfoot.com).

Boston Architectural Center — $7,500 to support Center Summer Academy, a five-week program designed to educate and guide high-school students through a design and construction process enabling them to understand the relationships among spaces, the built environment, and the quality of life as experienced in the neighborhood, the workplace, and the larger urban environment (Barbara Shenker, 617-585-0281 / barbara.shenker@the-bac.edu).

The Foundation is chaired by Boston civic leader Rob Radloff and the Board of Trustees also includes Ron Ancrum (president of Associated Grant Makers, the statewide association of grant-making foundations and corporations), Ena Fox (director of education at the ICA), Roger Goldstein FAIA (a principal with the Boston architecture firm of Goody Clancy), Richard Green FAIA (former chair of the Foundation), Robert Kuehn (Keen Development Corp.), Peter Kuttner FAIA (managing principal of Cambridge Seven Associates and vice-chair of the Foundation), Ted Landsmark, Assoc. AIA (president of the Boston Architectural Center), Susan Leff (financial advisor at KeyBank and treasurer of the Foundation), Peter Madsen FAIA (president of Edo Essex Properties), civic leader Dr. Kyra Montagu, Sam Plimpton (Baupost Group), Mysore Ravindra P.E. (managing principal of LeMessurier Consultants), Lisa Reindorf AIA (principal of Goldman Reindorf Architects and secretary of the Foundation), and Linda Snyder (executive director of the Massachusetts State College Building Authority).

The Engineering Center Education Trust is represented in the grant-making process by Paul Moyer P.E. (VP/Branch Manager of Dewberry-Goodkind in Boston) and Carlos Peņa P.E. of CLE Engineering in Marion. The Trust is a collaboration of the American Council of Engineering Companies of Massachusetts, the Boston Society of Civil Engineers, and the Massachusetts Association of Land Surveyors and Civil Engineers.

For information on how to contribute to the Foundation to support community programs such as those described here or with other questions, write/call Foundation executive director Richard Fitzgerald at rfitzgerald@architects.org / 617-951-1433x232.