The board of the Akron Community Foundation recently approved $1.85 million in grants.
A total of 279 grants, in excess of $1.4 million, were approved from designated, donor-advised, agency endowment and scholarship funds.
The majority of the foundation’s discretionary funding this cycle — 20 grants totaling $450,000 — was directed toward programs that target early learning initiatives to help prepare young children for school.
A $15,000 grant to Greenleaf Family Center will help expand the home-based early education initiative for 3- and 4-year-olds in the Akron Public Schools system known as the SPARK program into Crouse, David Hill, Glover, Leggett, Mason, McEbright and Robinson schools during the 2013-14 school year.
Other grants for early learning initiatives went to:
• Asian Services in Action Inc., $12,500 for the Ready Program, an early childhood development program for children in refugee families.
• Building for Tomorrow, $95,000 to continue early education and other programs and services for children under age 5 living in AMHA housing.
• Child Guidance & Family Solutions Inc., $65,000 for its Toddlers and Preschoolers Succeeding Program.
• Project GRAD Akron, $25,000 for the Bridge to Kindergarten school readiness camp for students and their parents in the Buchtel cluster of APS.
• Summit County Family & Children First Council, $25,000 to implement a standardized developmental screening and referral process for all children ages birth to 5 in Summit County.
Other grants went to:
• Akron International Friendship, $5,000 for the Know Your Community — Know Your World project, which teaches sixth-graders in Akron and Tallmadge schools about the importance of ethnic, cultural and religious diversity.
• Akron Public Schools, $15,000 for Destination College, which prepares high school students for college.
• All-Star Training Club, $10,000 for the Summer Academic Sports Camp for children and young adults with disabilities.
• Arc of Summit & Portage Counties Inc., $10,000 for the People Together program, which increases disability awareness and acceptance among students in Summit County schools.
• Big Brothers and Sisters of Summit and Medina Counties Inc., $10,000 for community- and school-based mentoring programs.
• Boys & Girls Clubs of the Western Reserve, $70,000 for after-school programming.
• First Book, $7,000 to purchase books for children living in poverty.
• Hattie Larlham Community Services, $20,000 to support a sustainable agriculture vocational program for adults with developmental disabilities.
• Junior Achievement of North Central Ohio, $10,000 for JA More Than Money, which teaches work force readiness, entrepreneurship and financial literacy to third-, fourth- and fifth-graders.
• Project LEARN of Summit County, $23,000 to prepare GED candidates.
• Research Education & Charitable Association for the Benefit of the Chefs & Farmers (Veggie U.), $10,000 to purchase Earth to Table science kits, which teach fourth-graders in Akron schools about sustainable agriculture and healthy eating.
• Tri-County Jobs for Ohio’s Graduates, $10,000 to support the Dropout Recovery Program, which provides academic and employment support to Summit County youths.
• Twinsburg school district, $5,000 for the Project Star summer reading program, which aims to improve reading proficiency in elementary students.
• YMCA of Akron, $7,500 to provide after-school programming.
In 1955, a $1 million bequest from the estate of Edwin Shaw established the Akron Community Foundation. For more information, call 330-376-8522 or go to www.akroncf.org.