Four leading companies partner in support of
education and workforce development mission
NEWPORT
NEWS, Va., Dec. 11, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- Today, the
BayPort Foundation, Ferguson, Newport News Shipbuilding, a division
of HII, and Virginia Natural Gas announced that the Newport News
Education Foundation has been awarded the $500,000 Accelerating Change Together (ACT) Grant
to support the Newport News Public
Schools (NNPS) New Teacher Institute (NTI) program. The ACT Grant
extends the four companies' existing charitable giving and social
impact efforts to its education and workforce development
mission.
The three-year, $500,000 step-down
grant will provide the funding necessary for NTI to answer the
regional call to build a workforce pipeline to expand its new
first—and second-year teacher programs. It will also fund the
development of a model program, provide credentialing assistance,
and invest in Career and Technical Education and English as a
Second Language teachers.
The ACT Grant will assist the Newport News Education Foundation
in raising funding to guarantee support for the NTI program. The
expiration of the Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief
(ESSER) funds could have several consequences as districts look to
trim expenses and consolidate operations. ESSER was a one-time
emergency relief program designed to support K-12 schools in
response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Twenty-one nonprofits submitted an ACT Grant application. The
Contributions Committee selected the Newport News Education
Foundation application based on its ability to address the specific
needs outlined in the ACT Grant application, including a sound
financial investment and an original, innovative, and sustainable
project plan to impact a target population/community.
The ACT Grant initiative launched in 2022, and the first
recipient was the Virginia Beach Education Foundation and
Virginia Beach City Public Schools
(VBCPS), new two-year, half-day Advanced Technology Center
Renewable Energy Technologies program.
For additional information on the ACT Grant, please
visit actgrant.org.
B-roll of the NNPS NTI program facility and check
presentation is available upon request.
About BayPort Foundation
BayPort Foundation is the
charitable arm of BayPort Credit Union, headquartered in
Newport News, Virginia and was
established to extend the credit union's philosophy of "people
helping people." The Foundation is an extension of the credit
union's charitable giving. BayPort Credit Union commits more than
half a million dollars in annual corporate donations and pays all
the Foundation's overhead to ensure that 100% of the Foundation
donations support its mission. For more information,
visit bayportfoundation.org.
About Ferguson
Ferguson (NYSE: FERG; LSE: FERG) is the
largest value-added distributor serving the specialized
professional in our $340B residential
and non-residential North American construction market. We help
make our customers' complex projects simple, successful and
sustainable by providing expertise and a wide range of products and
services from plumbing, HVAC, appliances and lighting to PVF, water
and wastewater solutions and more. Headquartered in Newport News, Va., Ferguson has sales of
$29.6 billion (FY'24) and
approximately 35,000 associates in nearly 1,800 locations. For more
information, please visit corporate.ferguson.com.
About HII
HII is a global, all-domain defense
provider. HII's mission is to deliver the world's most powerful
ships and all-domain solutions in service of the nation, creating
the advantage for our customers to protect peace and freedom around
the world. As the nation's largest military shipbuilder, and with a
more than 135-year history of advancing U.S. national security, HII
delivers critical capabilities extending from ships to unmanned
systems, cyber, ISR, AI/ML and synthetic training. Headquartered in
Virginia, HII's workforce is
44,000 strong. For more information, please
visit hii.com.
About Virginia Natural Gas
Virginia Natural Gas is one
of four natural gas distribution companies of Southern Company Gas,
a wholly owned subsidiary of Southern Company (NYSE: SO). Virginia
Natural Gas provides natural gas service to nearly 300,000
customers in southeast Virginia.
Named a Top Workplace in 2024, Virginia Natural Gas also has been
recognized as one of the safest, most reliable and customer-focused
natural gas service providers and is consistently ranked in the top
quartile for customer satisfaction by J.D. Power and Associates.
For more information,
visit virginianaturalgas.com.
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SOURCE BayPort Credit Union