It’s become increasingly difficult for schools to fund learning opportunities outside the classroom. To help them out, Target launched Target Field Trip™ grants in 2007. Since then, millions of students have been able to go on a field trip. The application period opens August 1.
A partnership with DuPont Pioneer and the National Science Teachers Association, this award is to recognize excellence and innovation in the field of agricultural science education. Two awards, one middle level and one high school level, will be awarded annually. The awardee will receive a $2,500 grant for their classroom/program, up to $1,000 paid travel expenses to attend the NSTA national conference on science education, mentoring with a DuPont Pioneer scientist, classroom resources from DuPont Pioneer, and access to a DuPont Pioneer product plant or research facility. The awardees will be presented the award at the Teacher Awards Banquet at the National Conference.
Fuel Up to Play 60 is an in-school nutrition and physical activity program launched by National Dairy Council and NFL, in collaboration with the USDA, to help encourage today’s youth to lead healthier lives.
This contest challenges developers and college students in the United States to create a unique, user-friendly and impactful application that will integrate with the Blackboard Learn learning management system to improve the teaching and learning experience.
Gail McKnight Beckman created the Beckman Award to benefit teachers who have inspired their former students to make a significant contribution to society. The award is given to current or former academic faculty members who have inspired their former students to “create an organization which has demonstrably conferred a benefit on the community at large.”
The purpose of this grant is to increase the breadth and depth of the mathematics content knowledge of one elementary school teacher who has a demonstrated commitment to mathematics teaching and learning. The applicant must have the support of the school principal in becoming a mathematics teacher-leader within her or his school or district.
This award honors one elementary school teacher who has established (or is establishing) an interdisciplinary, inquiry-based lesson plan. The lesson plan will fully reference sources of information and any relevant National Science Education Standards and benchmarks found in the Atlas of Science Literacy. The award consists of $1,000 and up to $500 to attend the NSTA National Conference on Science Education; the recipient of the award will be honored during the Awards Banquet at the NSTA Conference.
Grants are available for up to $500. Classroom grants can be used for a variety of projects and materials, including but not limited to books, software, calculators, math manipulatives, art supplies, audio-visual equipment, and lab materials. Funds must be used within one year of the application deadline.
The Maitland P. Simmons Memorial Award for New Teachers provides selected K–12 teachers (up to 25) in their first five years of teaching with funds to attend the annual National Conference on Science Education. Award recipients will be mentored, tracked, and provided with continuing opportunities for meaningful involvement with NSTA and its activities.
I don’t really need to belabor the point that securing educational institutions is both incredibly challenging and crucially important; it’s a bit like describing the importance of water to a fish. Schools and universities are here for the primary purpose of education, but they often have groups devoted to healthcare, finance, retail, and research, among the other usual administrative departments like human resources and accounting.
And with that breadth of service comes an alphabet soup of security compliance regulations that you need to be aware of; like HIPAA, CIPA, COPPA, FERPA and PPRA. And within higher education, there is also the expectation of an openness of information within and throughout the organization. How on earth can colleges and universities be expected both to fiercely guard and freely share information?
Information and Assets in Context
If we think of security and privacy in the context of our daily lives, there are things each of us consider private (including both property and information) and would take steps to make sure they’re shared with a limited number of people, such as close family members.
And then there are other things that we would give away freely to anyone who asked. Most of us don’t have to give this process a lot of thought, and the categorization happens automatically because our personal context is relatively stable.
When you have the interests of more than just a small group of people to consider, you will be bringing a myriad of different contexts into the equation. But there is a significant advantage in having a wealth of different people contributing their privacy contexts and their visibility into your environment, as it can help you root out the most persnickety corner cases.
3 Campus Security Musts for Summer Kick Off
1. Know what you have
As the recent WannaCryptor ransomware outbreak illustrated, the security chain is only as strong as its weakest link. It’s important to identify all of your assets, in terms of both data and physical machines.
It’s important to be thorough; attackers will not necessarily enter networks through obvious places, and it is equally important to include that one machine moldering in a back room that is running prehistoric versions of software, and that is nonetheless connected to the internet. Because school networks have such an itinerant population, this must be an ongoing task rather than a yearly chore.
Once you have established regular reporting of your assets, you can start identifying the risks associated with those assets. Performing ongoing risk assessment gives you a number of other benefits. Having a constantly evolving record of your assets improves reporting and tracking of security incidents and it can help you recognize suspicious actions more quickly.
In an industry where budget cuts can seem to be as certain as death and taxes, good records can also help justify the necessity of budget items, and help assure more appropriate levels of coverage with whatever money is allotted.
