Longtime Huntington UFSD elementary school teacher Allison VonVange and local business owners Mary Alice Meinersman and Susannah Meinersman of Bon Bons Chocolatier will be honored at the Huntington Foundation for Excellence in Education’s 2020 gala.
The twin Spirits Awards will formally be presented at the Huntington Foundation’s 27th annual Reach for the Stars gala on Thursday, March 5 at The Mansion at Oyster Bay. HFEE has donated more than $1 million to Huntington UFSD over the years to support innovative programs and classroom practices.
HFEE’s Reach for the Stars dinner is still many months off, but the organization is already at work planning an event that is expected to attract more than 300 supporters of public education.
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The Foundation is also now in the midst of soliciting applications from faculty members for this year’s grant program. “It’s a new year and with that brings a new opportunity to submit more of your innovative, educational ideas for financial support from HFEE,” according to the organization’s website. “We love to see really new grants that support any area of education within our district. Primary teachers through high school teachers and everyone in between are welcome to submit a grant in any amount by January 31, 2020. We have combined our grant dates into one overall date in an effort to streamline the process for all involved.”
HFEE funded 15 grants amounting to about $30,000 in the 2018/19 school year. “These grants ranged from math initiatives in the primary schools to bilingual concepts at the high school,” the organization said.
The organization’s executive officers board of directors includes Amy Girimonti (vice president for development), Deborah Knowles (chief financial officer), Susan Lyons (vice president for grants), Andrea Boccard (vice president for public relations) Michele Sabatino (secretary) and board members Alice Marie Rorke, Laura Cheshire (gala assistant), Laura Colavecchio (youth board coordinator), Toniann Mangan (grants liaison), Kristine Colleluori, Tara Poli and Kerri Malone. Volunteers include Laurene Napurano (tech support), Cynthia Vitulli, Kimberley Steinberg, Paige Furman and Laura Mills.
A brand new logo is also in the works for HFEE. Huntington High School art teacher Kasmira Mohanty and graphic arts students are developing a redesigned logo for the organization. “It’s very much a work in progress, but the kids are doing a great job,” Mrs. Boccard said. “We’re hoping to have the new logo, entirely student designed, before the gala.”
Huntington Foundation history
Parent Nancy Lundell came up with the original idea for an educational foundation in 1993. She pulled together a group of people, including fellow district parents Beverly Wayne and Elliot Levine, an attorney who performed the legal work necessary to formally create the Foundation’s corporate structure.
That small group of parents, along with several others, began meeting in the superintendent’s conference room in what was then the administrative wing at Woodhull School. It was from those meetings that the Huntington Foundation for Excellence in Education emerged, becoming a non-profit organization in 1994, with formal bylaws, a logo and a board of directors.
In addition to Mrs. Lundell, Mrs. Wayne and Mr. Levine, the original directors included Diane Kirchner, Tom Webster, Susan Agolia, Paula Schneider and Susan Jouard. The first fundraiser was held on a Sunday afternoon at the old Coco’s Water Café on New York Avenue in Halesite. (The site is now occupied by Prime.)
The original group of volunteers devoted and enormous amount of time to the organization, helping to insure its long-term success.
