San Gabriel Valley Tribune (West Covina, CA)
September 11, 2008
by Emma Gallegos, Staff Writer

Teachers often find themselves doing extra credit – applying for grants, wooing donors and, often, reaching into their own pockets – to fill the gap between their budgets and their wishlists for their classroom supplies. And, increasingly, they’re going online to fill that gap.

Pene Tackaberry, a kindergarten teacher at San Jose-Edison Academy in West Covina, said she normally spends between $1,000 and $2,000 out-of-pocket each year on supplies in her classroom.

But this year, she had a little help. She started this September with new art supplies donated by Heartland Hospice Care in West Covina, thanks to a San Diego-based nonprofit iLoveSchools.com.

Her principal, Dr. Denise Patton, didn’t tell Tackaberry about the site, but Patton said that she’s not surprised. At her charter school, she tries to make sure everyone at her school “speaks technology as a second language.”

They make regular use of Web sites such as the National Charter School Clearinghouse to find grants, and they encourage parents to use online search engines that earn money for their school.

“In the old days … it was a tedious process,” Patton said. “But with the Internet, it’s all at your fingertips.”

Charter schools have a special incentive to make use of resources increasingly available online – they are at risk of losing their charters if they don’t stay financially solvent. But they aren’t the only ones taking advantage of the Internet.

More and more, teachers are logging on to sites like iLoveSchools.com and DonorsChoose.org to request basics like construction paper and markers, as well as high-tech, high-priced items such as DVD players and camcorders.

Julie Serna, a first-grade teacher at Monte Vista in West Covina, said she heard about iLoveSchools.com at a staff meeting a few years ago. She logged on and registered, and one day she received a check in the mail from an association of retired teachers she had never met to purchase binders for her students’ writing portfolios.

Serna’s experience is typical. Jerry Hall, founder of iLoveSchools.com, describes his Web site as a kind of bulletin board, where donors can find teachers’ wishlists.

In the San Gabriel Valley, iLoveSchools.com has really taken off in the San Gabriel Valley – especially in West Covina where 110 out of 953 teachers have registered.

But Hall said the current version of the site is only the beginning. At the end of the month, he will be re-launching his five-year-old Web site to accomodate the demands of – not teachers, surprisingly – but donors. Hall said they are clamoring for a site that is easier to search and allows them to offer supplies they might already have, instead of seeking out teachers who might need what they have.

Until then, grant mavens like Yumi Nakatani, who teaches sixth-grade math at Edgewood Middle school, will keep on doing what she’s done best for as long as she’s taught.

As more nonprofits and grants migrate online or become more accessible by simple Google searches, she has moved online, too. But mostly, Nakatani said she regularly pores through fliers in her mailbox to find out about different foundations and grants that might improve her students’ learning experience.

Nakatani said it takes a lot of extra time out of her normal teaching schedule, but she said it goes with the territory: “As teachers, our professional and private lives are kind of mixed up.”

emma.gallegos@sgvn.com
(626) 962-8811, Ext. 2705
(c) 2008 San Gabriel Valley Tribune. All rights reserved. Reproduced with the permission of Media NewsGroup, Inc. by NewsBank, Inc.