How do we create equity for students when they are learning at home?

Looser-Flake Foundation accelerates grant awards to support technology and equity in two Illinois school districts

As school districts across the region consider how education will be delivered this fall due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the two largest school districts serving Mercer County students in Illinois will continue their pursuit to ensure every single student has access to technology.

The Looser-Flake Foundation, a private foundation administered through the Quad Cities Community Foundation, is awarding $212,000 in grants to promote equity in access to learning through technology. This is not the first time that the Looser-Flake Foundation has provided technology support to both Mercer County School District and Sherrard School District. Still, it is the first time the foundation has accelerated the granting process due to the COVID-19 pandemic. 

“With this grant, the foundation has really launched us into a different arena for education,” said Steve Miller, instructional technology coach for the Sherrard School District. “It tells me exactly what the foundation believes about the families and kids and parents of this community. This is an incredibly meaningful, timely, and critical grant for us.”

After meeting with school officials remotely to hear firsthand the districts’ needs, foundation board members granted more than $90,000 in additional dollars than the original $120,000 budgeted. Mercer County also received $12,000 to reimburse teachers for costs incurred through remote learning over the past few months. 

The funding helps both districts prepare for the uncertainty of the upcoming school year and the possibility of remote learning. The grants also equip them with technology upgrades that will last long into the future, Miller added.

“We had to be really creative this year when we requested funding because this was about creating equity,” Miller said. “Students have been coming to school buildings for years because it made things equal. If they aren’t in the building now, how do we do that?”

The funding will provide two significant improvements, including technology equipment for nearly every classroom to allow teachers to do more livestream teaching. It’s essential, Miller said, as teachers need to connect and build relationships with students consistently. The second is providing wireless access points within the community, and on school buses, to reach students who do not have Internet access at home. The grant will also allow Sherrard School District to reimburse families for Internet provider costs.

In the Mercer County School District, one out of 10 families reported not having any Internet access within the home. “For us, that’s a lot of kids—it amounts to more than 150 families,” said Superintendent Scott Petrie. “Now, we’re going to be able to help change that.”

The foundation’s support has propelled the district ahead in technology not only this year but in previous years, Petrie added. “We would not have been able to do these upgrades at the pace without their support,” he said. “To go from no student devices four years ago to now having every student with a laptop from kindergarten through 12th grade is amazing. And now, to have Internet access on buses is something really exciting.” 

Miller said the district quickly adjusted to the technology needs last year during the pandemic thanks in part to investments in technology they were able to make due to dollars from the Looser-Flake Foundation, but this year will look much different. “Last school year, we were in the midst of a crisis, and this year we will be able to do everything so much better with this new technology,” he said.

Miller said the pandemic has opened up conversations about education that might not have happened. “This is an opportunity for change,” he said. “We’ve had kids in school buildings for seven hours a day for hundreds of years, and now there’s a pivot in thinking. I’m hopeful and confident about this year. Our teachers are awesome, and they are ready to jump in and go with it.”

Both educators said the grants are particularly meaningful because they are the result of two women who were deeply committed to furthering educational opportunities for students in the region they once called home. The foundation was started through a generous $6 million gift from Dorothy Looser-Flake and Roberta Looser to support Mercer County upon their passing. The two sisters were born and raised on a family farm near New Boston Township, Illinois. Dorothy was a fifth-grade teacher in the Rock Island-Milan School District, and Roberta taught in both Mercer County and the Rock Island–Milan School District. 

“I’m not sure that Dorothy and Roberta would ever have anticipated the challenges that schools are facing this fall,” reflected Kelly Thompson, vice president of grantmaking and community initiatives and the administrator for the foundation fund at the Quad Cities Community Foundation. “I think, though, that they would be so proud of the districts and teachers their deep commitment to the needs of students. I think they’d also be proud of the Looser-Flake Foundation’s board for making the thoughtful, swift decisions they have made that will ensure their legacy lives on—especially during this critical moment in the lives of so many.”