Vermont Humanities Council awards $19,000 in grants

Vermont Humanities Council grant awards will make a humanities impact throughout Vermont this year. In all, VHC made nine awards to nonprofits for humanities programming, totaling $19,100.
The Vermont Folklife Center has received a $5,000 grant from the Vermont Humanities Council for its online resource project, “New Vermonters from the Balkans.” The grant is one of nine awards given by VHC to Vermont organizations during its spring 2010 grant cycle.“New Vermonters from the Balkans” will make the Vermont Folklife Center’s research, photographs, and videos available via a new Web site to raise awareness of the refugee resettlement experience in Vermont. The project parallels VHC’s Vermont Reads 2010 program, which focuses on Katherine Paterson’s book, The Day of the Pelican, a novel about a family from Kosovo and its flight from Serbian aggression to refuge in Vermont.
VHC’s spring grant awards also support three Vermont literary events this year: the Brattleboro Literary Festival; the Burlington Book Festival; and Bookstock: The Green Mountain Festival of Words, held in Woodstock. The Burlington and Brattleboro festivals have flourished for several years, and the festival in Woodstock looks forward to a second successful event.
Other grant awards support a continuing series of county history films produced by Johnson State College students, an exhibit on Mexican migrant workers on Vermont farms, and a musicological lecture series through the Yellow Barn Music School. A full list of grantees and awards is provided below.
Twice a year, through a competitive grant process, VHC makes awards to museums and libraries, film, music and literary festivals, and local historical societies, supporting public humanities programs that contribute to the achievement of its mission. The largest grant VHC will award for any one project is $5,000.
VHC’s Spring 2010 grant awardees are as follows:
Bent Northrop Memorial Library, Fairfield, (The Golden Cage: Mexican Migrant Workers and Vermont Dairy Farmers Exhibit), $500.Building a Better Brattleboro (2010 Brattleboro Literary Festival), $3,000.Johnson State College (Life in Essex County and Life in Caledonia County films), $1,000.Opera Theatre of Weston (The Magic Flute Storybook Opera Project), $2,000.Pentangle Council on the Arts, Woodstock (2nd Annual Bookstock: The Green Mountain Festival of Words), $1,600.6th Annual Burlington Book Festival, $2,500.Vermont Folklife Center, Middlebury, (New Vermonters from the Balkans: An Online Resource), $5,000.Vital Communities, White River Junction, (Colonial Quest teacher workshops), $2,500.Yellow Barn Music School & Festival, Putney, (2010 Yellow Barn Musicological Lecture Series), $1,000.
The next Vermont Humanities Council grant cycle is this fall. Organizations wishing to apply should visit vermonthumanities.org or call 802.262.2626 x304. Letters of intent for the fall application round are due September 13. Final applications are due October 22 and grant awards are made in December.
The Vermont Humanities Council is a private nonprofit working to bring the power and the pleasure of the humanities to all Vermonters – of every background and in every community. The Council envisions a state in which every individual learns throughout life – a state in which all its citizens read, reflect, and participate in public affairs.
Source: Vermont Humanities Council, www.vermonthumanities.org. 6.22.2010# # #