Westborough Wins a $220,000 Technology Grant for Mill Pond School

Westborough Public Schools announced recently that the state awarded a technology grant to the town for $220,000. Nearly 100 districts applied for this source of state funding, and Westborough was one of 14 districts to win it.

“We wrote the grant because our technology infrastructure is not as strong as it should be,” said the school department in a press release. “Any alternative funding helps us move more quickly with less budget impact to the town, which is always a goal. We want to commend our team for preparing a grant that resulted in such a generous amount of funding. Clearly the award committee recognized in the Mill Pond School a site that would benefit from an improved infrastructure.”

The state grant can only be spent on infrastructure, but the district has to provide 50 percent in matching funds and those funds can be spent on devices. The grant will allow the Mill Pond School to upgrade its Wi-Fi system and also launch a 1:1 initiative for grade 6.

“Computers and the internet provide powerful teaching and learning tools and there are fantastic applications we will use that will allow us to teach students communication, collaboration, critical thinking, and research skills.”

The grant creates some budget pressure that wasn’t anticipated. Since Mill Pond was not planning to upgrade the Wi-Fi system for another two years, it needs to come up with the matching funds.