Funding will help boost job creation, job training and education
July 28, 2010
Washington, DC – Nevada Senator Harry Reid today announced that he secured $13.7 million for Nevada in the Labor, Health and Human Services and Education Appropriations bill that was approved by the Senate Labor-Health and Human Services, and Education Subcommittee. Included is more than $5 million in funding for education projects including school construction and modernization, early education, online college courses and distance education. There is more than $1 million for job training and resources to help Nevadans prepare for a new career. And there is more than $6 million for health care related projects that will help improve outpatient care, health care in rural Nevada and improved access for seniors and children.
“The funding in this bill will go a long way toward creating jobs and improving education, job training and access to health care in Nevada,” Reid said. “In addition to the funding for projects in Las Vegas and Reno, I made it a priority to ensure that funding reaches schools across the state, including in Battle Mountain, Elko, Fallon, Pahrump, Panaca, Winnemucca, and Yerington. While it’s clear the state has a lot of work to do to fund education properly, I will continue doing all I can to help these students get the education they deserve.”
The full list of funding included in the bill is below:
EDUCATION: Total - $6,925,000
Project: Statewide School Construction and Modernization Matching Grants
Location: School Districts Statewide
Amount: $2 million
Description: Senator Reid requested funding to create a grant program for school districts across Nevada. Districts would be able to apply for matching funds to support new construction, renovation or modernization of school facilities. While large urban districts around the country downsize and close school facilities, Nevada’s largest school districts continue to grow. While the pace of growth has slowed in the last year, securing funding for school construction remains a challenge. Nevada’s vast rural school districts face a different challenge – finding funding to renovate and modernize their aging facilities. These funds will allow districts to use scarce resources to improve instruction, rather than on construction and facility improvement.
Project: College of Optometry and Optometry Clinic
Requestor: Touro University Nevada
Location: Henderson, NV
Amount: $750,000
Description: These funds would be used to construct and equip a College of Optometry, including an Optometry Clinic. There are currently no colleges of optometry in Nevada. The curriculum would focus on geriatric and rural issues. The associated clinic would serve approximately two hundred patients per week and provide necessary clinical training for optometry students.
Project: Center for Autism Spectrum Disorders Family Research and Service Clinic
Requestor: University of Nevada, Las Vegas
Location: Las Vegas, NV
Amount: $500,000
Description: These funds would be used to develop a clinic for families to access services and to increase the capacity of professionals in the community through training. This will help to alleviate the long waiting period for appropriate diagnostic services and for early intervention services for children with autism spectrum disorders in Southern Nevada.
Project: School for the Highly Gifted
Requestor: Clark County School District
Location: Las Vegas, NV
Amount: $750,000
Description: The Clark County School District, home to nearly three-quarters of the students in Nevada, will work, in partnership with the Nevada System of Higher Education, to create an academy for the highly gifted in grades 9-12. Nearly 200 students in the district have been identified as highly-gifted. Recognizing that gifted children learn differently, this project will be committed to providing an academically appropriate learning environment that is challenging and meaningful.
Project: Family Leadership Initiative
Requestor: Clark County School District
Location: Las Vegas, NV
Amount: $300,000
Description: These funds would be used to expand the Family Leadership Initiative, which provides a parent training course to non-English speaking parents to teach them how to communicate with their child's school and advocate in the best interests of their children, to seven additional low-income schools. Parent involvement is essential in raising student achievement, and this program provides parents with the tools to better assist their children.
Project: Early Education Program
Requestor: Lyon County School District
Location: Yerington, NV
Amount: $150,000
Description: Early education provides many students the important foundation they will need to be successful in school. These funds would be used to provide early education services to children in Fernley, Silver Springs, and Yerington, as well as children from the Yerington and Walker River Paiute Indian Tribes.
Project: Mathematics Textbooks and Curriculum Specialists
Requestor: Nye County School District
Location: Pahrump, NV
Amount: $350,000
Description: These funds would be used to support the purchase of K-12 math textbooks for students across the district, as well as instructional specialists to provide professional development and student intervention in math at district’s lowest-performing schools.
Project: Success First Program
Requestor: Truckee Meadows Community College
Location: Reno, NV
Amount: $200,000
Description: These funds would be used for recruitment activities, mentoring, and tutoring programs for first generation, low-income high school seniors that continue their education at Truckee Meadows Community College, and to provide supportive services throughout their time at the college.
Project: STEM Curriculum and Technology Improvements
Requestor: Churchill County School District
Location: Fallon, NV
Amount: $25,000
Description: These funds would purchase new technology and curriculum for the district’s high school STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math) program and would benefit all students in the district. Already, over ninety percent of the project funding has been secured.
Project: Expansion of Online Courses
Requestor: College of Southern Nevada
Location: Las Vegas, NV
Amount: $400,000
Description: As state support for higher education continues to be cut, students at Nevada’s largest community college face the prospect of reduced and limited class offerings. These funds would help expand the number of online courses in education and training programs, and allow students to get the classes they need in order to complete their degree. More than 43,000 students will have greater access to online courses as a result of these funds.
Project: Jobs for the Next Decade
Requestor: Great Basin College
Location: Elko, NV
Amount: $200,000
Description: The Bureau of Labor Statistics has identified the fastest growing occupations in the coming decade, which include information technology, health care, and education. There is a great need for qualified employees in these fields across rural Nevada. Great Basin College would use these funds to support academic and career and technical education in these high-need fields.
Project: Washoe County School District Graduation Initiative
Requestor: Washoe County School District
Location: Reno, Nevada
Amount: $500,000
Description: Nevada has one of the highest dropout rates in the nation, with less than 70% of all high school students graduating on time. This funding would support additional education professionals to focus on keeping at-risk high school freshmen and other at-risk high school student populations engaged and in school.
Project: Afterschool Programs
Requestor: Lincoln County School District
Location: Panaca, Nevada
Amount: $50,000
Description: Multiple years of state budget cuts have decimated early education and afterschool programs across Nevada. These funds will help restore afterschool programs for at-risk students in the district.
Project: Technology Enhancements
Requestor: Lander County School District
Location: Battle Mountain, Nevada
Amount: $150,000
Description: These funds will help purchase software, hardware, electronic and other equipment needed to upgrade the antiquated student computer system and to modernize career and technical education facilities.
Project: Expansion of Online Courses
Requestor: Nevada State College
Location: Henderson, NV
Amount: $200,000
Description: As state support for higher education continues to be cut, students at Nevada State College face the prospect of reduced and limited class offerings. These funds would help expand the number of online courses and allow students to get the classes they need in order to complete their degree.
Project: Technology-Based Instruction Program
Requestor: Humboldt County School District
Location: Winnemucca, Nevada
Amount: $150,000
Description: These funds would help expand tech-based instruction, including remediation and accelerated curriculum, and allow all students in the district to have access to 150 state-approved courses.
Project: Afterschool Tutoring Program
Requestor: Education Alliance of Washoe County
Location: Reno, Nevada
Amount: $150,000
Description: These funds would provide afterschool tutoring support in ten elementary schools that do not receive federal Title 1 funds but are Title I-eligible. Tutoring support will be provided to all Washoe County School District secondary students in all core content areas.
Project: Teacher Exchange Program
Requestor: Public Education Foundation of Clark County
Location: Las Vegas, Nevada
Amount: $100,000
Description: With multiple years of state budget cuts, teachers across Nevada are forced to purchase more classroom and instructional materials out of their own pockets. These funds would help create an innovative “teacher exchange,” to provide a clearinghouse for donations, classroom materials and supplies for educators across Clark County.
HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES: Total - $5,895,000
Project: Out-Patient Diabetic Education Project
Requestor: University Medical Center of Southern Nevada
Location: Las Vegas, NV
Amount: $300,000
Description: These funds would be used to establish a diabetic education project for patients referred from all points of services at UMC. Diabetes is a chronic disease that affects many of the disadvantaged populations served by UMC. Education and outreach can reduce the cases of hospitalization and improve the quality of health care for those affected.
Project: Nursing Development Program
Requestor: Renown Health
Location: Reno, NV
Amount: $500,000
Description: These funds would be used to develop the Renown Health Nursing Development Program to increase the number of nursing graduates from the local nursing schools, including the Orvis School of Nursing and the Truckee Meadow Community College. This proposal would expand the local nursing programs’ capacity to admit additional nursing students, which will result in additional graduates to help ease the nursing shortage in Nevada.
Project: Nye Regional Hospital
Requestor: Nye County, NV
Location: Tonopah, NV
Amount: $400,000
Description: These funds would be used to make facilities improvements, including the development of a designated decontamination area, to the Nye Regional Hospital in Tonopah, Nevada. The Nye Regional Hospital is located approximately two hundred miles from the nearest major hospital and trauma center and would play a key role in responding to any emergency or mass casualty event in the region.
Project: Oral Health Program for Youth and Pregnant Women
Requestor: St. Mary’s Foundation for St. Mary’s Regional Medical Center
Location: Reno, NV
Amount: $300,000
Description: These funds would be used to reinitiate an oral health program that provides services to children and pregnant women. The program provides sealants for uninsured children in order to reduce their risk of developing cavities. It also provides oral health services to at-risk pregnant women in an effort to reduce low birth weight or preterm deliveries.
Project: Nurse Family Partnership
Requestor: Southern Nevada Health District
Location: Las Vegas, NV
Amount: $400,000
Description: These funds would support the Nurse Family Partnership, an evidence-based home visitation program providing services to low income, first-time mothers. This initiative is aimed at breaking the cycle of poverty and promoting the early health, development and well-being of low-income children and families with services that science and practice prove work.
Project: Community Immunization Project
Requestor: Southern Nevada Immunization Coalition
Location: Las Vegas, NV
Amount: $200,000
Description: These funds would increase access and provide immunizations at no cost for approximately 40,000 families and adults in Clark County who do not have access to vaccinations through the major sources of public sector funding, including the Vaccines for Children program and the Section 317 program.
Project: Statewide Healthcare Help Line
Requestor: Access to Healthcare Network
Location: Reno, NV
Amount: $330,000
Description: These funds would be used expand the Access to Healthcare Network’s Statewide Help Line. This service assists low income under and uninsured Nevada residents seeking information, application assistance and enrollment in the Access to Healthcare Network, Medicaid, Medicare, Nevada Checkup and social services available in each Nevada county (WIC, food banks, shelters, etc).
Project: Access to Pediatric Specialists
Requestor: Cure for the Kids Foundation
Location: Las Vegas, NV
Amount: $500,000
Description: These funds would be used to purchase equipment for a visiting physician’s center that will provide Nevada children access to pediatric specialists. This center will help children with cancer and other complex medical conditions who would otherwise have to travel out-of state for appropriate care or access to the latest treatment protocols and clinical trials.
Project: Research and Clinical Outpatient Facility for Neuro-Immune Diseases
Requestor: Whittemore-Peterson Institute for Neuro-Immune Disease
Location: Reno, NV
Amount: $1 million
Description: These funds would be used to build and equip a comprehensive research and clinical outpatient facility at the Whittemore Peterson Institute for Neuro-Immune Disease. This facility would serve patients with neuro-immune diseases such as Myalgic Encephaloyelitis/Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, atypical Multiple Sclerosis, Fibromyalgia, autism and others.
Project: Pediatric Crohn’s Disease Center
Requestor: University of Nevada, Reno
Location: Reno, NV
Amount: $300,000
Description: The Pediatric Crohn’s Disease Center will create a comprehensive program to offer a sub-specialty medical home that provides state-of-the art quality care for children and adolescents with inflammatory bowel disease.
Project: Colorectal Cancer Screening
Requestor: Nevada Cancer Institute
Location: Las Vegas, NV
Amount: $750,000
Description: These funds would be used to purchase equipment to provide state-of -the-art colorectal cancer screening at the Nevada Cancer Institute. Nevada consistently ranks among the worst in the nation for colorectal cancer screening rates. Improved access to screening and early detection will help to prevent deaths from colorectal cancer.
Project: Henderson Hospice
Requestor: Nathan Adelson Hospice Foundation
Location: Henderson, NV
Amount: $590,000
Description: These funds would be used to construct a new facility in Henderson that offers palliative and end-of-life care. This new facility would help to alleviate the shortage of in-patient hospice facilities in Southern Nevada.
Project: Las Vegas Senior Lifeline Program
Requestor: Jewish Federation of Las Vegas
Location: Las Vegas, NV
Amount: $100,000
Description: Funds would be used to support the Las Vegas Senior Lifeline Program which provides frail, lower-income seniors with resources to enable them to remain living independently in their own homes.
Project: Services for Children with Disabilities
Requestor: Nevada PEP (Parents Educating Parents)
Location: Elko, NV
Amount: $125,000
Description: Parent involvement is essential in raising student achievement, and this program provides parents with the tools to better assist their children. These funds would help expand services for parents in counties statewide for parents of students with disabilities about positive behavior interventions and the Nevada law regulating such methods.
Project: Rural Counties Respite Care Program
Requestor: Washoe County Senior Services
Location: Carson City, Nevada
Amount: $100,000
Description: The Rural Counties Respite Care Program addresses a critical need in the community -- that of free or affordable, non-medical in-home respite care for those suffering from dementia, Alzheimer’s, and a host of other ailments and disorders. The senior population in Nevada is among the fastest growing in the nation, so the number of caregivers and the demand for this program continues to increase. This community service program supports caregivers, and in turn, helps to prevent the institutionalization of their loved ones.
JOB TRAINING: Total - $870,000
Project: Career Connections Job Training Program
Requestor: Goodwill of Southern Nevada
Location: Las Vegas, NV
Amount: $100,000
Description: Goodwill operates two Career Connections centers to offer assistance to job seekers including career counseling and resume services. Because of the economic downturn, Goodwill does not have adequate resources to serve the number of individuals seeking help. Funding will expand the career service offerings at Goodwill so that they can help put more people back to work.
Project: Green Jobs Resource Center
Requestor: Envirolution
Location: Reno, NV
Amount: $200,000
Description: These funds will help establish a Green Jobs Resource Center, which will increase education, awareness, and preparedness for “green” jobs across Nevada. The center will have three components: a physical resource center located in Reno, an informational website, and a mobile green bus that can service the rural communities and travel to schools.
Project: Weatherization Training Program
Requestor: Easter Seals of Southern Nevada
Location: Las Vegas, NV
Amount: $200,000
Description: As a result of the Recovery Act, there are increased job opportunities in weatherizing homes and making more buildings energy efficient. These funds would help provide employment and weatherization training, job search, job development, employment counseling, job coaching for dislocated and hard-to-employ individuals.
Project: Job Training Program
Requestor: Foundation for an Independent Tomorrow
Location: Las Vegas, Nevada
Amount: $125,000
Description: These funds would help expand the “Self Sufficiency Program,” which moves unemployed and underemployed people into jobs and financial stability by providing individual assessments to determine abilities, interests and aptitude, and employment goals, and provide mentoring for vocational training and job preparation.
Project: PLUS Job Training Program
Requestor: Las Vegas-Clark County Urban League
Location: Las Vegas, Nevada
Amount: $145,000
Description: These funds would be used to expand the Program for Life and Urban Skills (PLUS) Program, which provides unemployed and underemployed individuals with job development, workforce readiness skills, career enhancement training, and job placement assistance. Nevada continues to have one of the highest unemployment rates in the nation and is in desperate need of additional job training programs.
Project: Employment Training Program
Requestor: Expertise, Inc.
Location: Las Vegas, NV
Amount: $100,000
Description: Nevada continues to have one of the highest unemployment rates in the nation and is in desperate need of additional job training programs. These funds would be used to support job training in high-demand professions.
