Bates Middle School teachers win Voya Unsung Heroes grant

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Bates Middle School teachers Cindy Seckel, Jermaine White, James Crawley, Iasha Lee and Donald Amis were recently named winners of a $2,000 grant as part of the Voya Unsung Heroes awards competition.

Through the Voya Unsung Heroes program, Voya Financial awards grants to K-12 educators nationwide to honor their innovative teaching methods, creative educational projects and ability to positively influence students. For more than 20 years, the program has awarded more than $5 million in grants to more than 2,000 educators in the United States.

According to a news release, the Bates team's innovative teaching idea, "Ages of Simple Machines," focuses on studying the Medieval Era and the use of machinery during this time period. With the Voya grant, students at Bates will construct simple medieval machines using interactive simulations requiring students to graph, measure, compare, predict and prove. The knowledge learned through the program will provide a greater understanding of how things work, provide a foundation for design mechanisms and teach the principles of mechanical design.

Selected from a group of more than 1,200 applicants, the Bates teachers are one of only 100 winners across the country who received this award. In addition, they will now compete with other finalists for one of the top three prizes - an additional $5,000, $10,000 or $25,000 from Voya Financial.