An effort to resurrect a Carbondale-centric foundation to support the local schools has yielded a fair amount of success over the last two years.
In October of last year, the new Carbondale Education Foundation (CEF) also resurrected the town’s Oktoberfest celebration, taking it on as a primary fundraiser for the organization.
The event raised more than $20,000 in its first year, with huge potential to grow even bigger, said CEF President Jamie Nims.
That money is now going directly into public schools in Carbondale in the form of teacher grants to help pay for classroom supplies and special grants for experiential learning.
To help celebrate, CEF is hosting its second teacher and staff appreciation event on Friday, Feb. 6, at the River Valley Ranch Old Thompson Barn.
“We want to honor the work of all the teachers and staff in the Carbondale public schools, and let them know that the community has their backs and is supporting them through some of the difficult financial transitions,” Nims said, referencing school district budget cuts that became necessary over the past year.
“We’ll have pizza and drinks and will be giving out gift cards and prizes,” he said. “We’re also including the kitchen, transportation and other support staff, because they tend to be less likely to get that public spotlight.”
While the two other Roaring Fork School District communities, Glenwood Springs and Basalt, have had strong local education foundations for many years, Carbondale was slower to bounce back after an unsuccessful attempt by the district several years ago to combine the local foundations into a single district foundation.
The new CEF was officially organized in December of 2023, after the annual Cowboy Up fundraiser took it on as the primary beneficiary for a couple of its events.
“That first year, we did a handful of random projects (including providing support for the school-based health centers), but this past year we became a little bit more focused,” Nims said.
The organization was able to award $32,500 in grants to offset the cost for school supplies for students who are free-and-reduced-lunch eligible and don’t pay school fees.
“Now we have $30,000 for experiential learning, whether that’s bringing people in or sending kids out on field trips, and just trying to increase unique enrichment opportunities for students across the schools.
“And that’s inclusive of the charters,” Nims said of the district- chartered Carbondale Community School, and the state-chartered Ross Montessori School. The alternative Bridges High School is also included in the foundation’s grant programs.
One such grant funded a visit to Crystal River Elementary School by aerial photographer and science educator Daniel Dancer of Art for the Sky.
Dancer had students wear blue and gold shirts and assemble in the school yard in the form of the Ram mascot. He then used a drone camera to capture the image with the number 427 at the top, signifying the parts-per-million carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere today.
Taking on the Oktoberfest celebration, formerly organized by the Carbondale Parks & Recreation Department up until 2020, seemed natural for the CEF, Nims said.
“We were able to put it together pretty quickly and got some major sponsors, and it was a huge success,” he said. CEF expects to make it an annual event.
Betsy After, who is one of the Carbondale representatives on the district’s Board of Education, said the education foundations
in Carbondale, Basalt and Glenwood Springs are able to tap into community generosity to provide supplemental funding for the public schools, which the district itself is not legally able to do.
“I’m particularly impressed and delighted by how quickly CEF has started up and been able to raise and distribute meaningful funds to schools in Carbondale,” she said.
Nims said he and his board hope to grow the foundation so that teacher grants can be an automatic “yes,” and to be able to expand the experiential learning grants.
The foundation would also like to be in a position to help offset the costs of providing free lunches for all students in the primary public schools, he said. The district was previously able to do that, at a cost of about $10,000 per school, but had to make cutbacks in that program.
CEF is also looking for more community members and businesses to support the foundation.
“There are a lot of people out there who may not want to join the board itself, but are willing to come in and help out and give a few hours here and there,” Nims said. “And, of course, if anyone wants to throw in any money to support teachers and staff, we’ll always take that.”
For more information and to donate, time or money, visit carbondaleeducationfoundation.org