Broad River Electric Cooperative, Inc.

Your Touchstone Energy Cooperative

Giving back to schools

Two smiling teachers hold their check to fund school supplies
Upstate Family Resource Center runs an afterschool program for the Boiling Springs area with a focus on elementary school-age kids. The Center was among the schools and organizations that received support from the cooperative for supplies and materials for their programs this year.

BREC funds supplies, teacher grants

As a new school year begins, Broad River Electric Cooperative is supporting local schools, teachers and students to help set them up for success.

These efforts are made possible in part by the generosity of members enrolled in Operation Round- Up, which rounds up their bill to the next dollar to generate charitable funds. This small change adds up to approximately $100,000 in annual donations to local charitable causes.

School supplies support

Before the new school year, BREC helped elementary schools and afterschool programs in its service area purchase classroom supplies and other materials that would benefit their students.

Checks for $500 each, totaling $11,000, were presented to 20 elementary schools and two afterschool programs across Cherokee, Spartanburg and Union counties.

Cherokee County schools: B.D. Lee, Blacksburg, Corinth, Draytonville, Grassy Pond, Limestone Central, Luther Vaughan, Northwest.

Union County schools: Buffalo, Foster Park, Jonesville, Monarch.

Spartanburg County schools: Cannons Campground, Cooley Springs-Fingerville, Cowpens, Fairforest, Inman, New Prospect, Pacolet, Pauline-Glenn Springs.

Afterschool programs: Kids Upstate, Upstate Family Resource Center.

Renovated classroom library is pictured
Riley Kozic, a 4th Grade teacher at Corinth Elementary School, was a Bright Ideas grant recipient for the 2022-2023 school year to help support a renovation of her classroom library. “I’m so excited to share this space with my new students this year,” Riley says.

Bright Ideas Grant winners and their projects

For the 2023-2024 academic year, Broad River Electric awarded a total of $14,151 in Bright Ideas Grants to fund 15 classroom needs and projects led by teachers in local schools.

The cooperative recently celebrated the grantees with an awards dinner at the Broad River Electric Cooperative headquarters. These local educators are dedicated to providing enriching educational experiences to our community’s students.

Here are the Bright Ideas grantees:

Cherokee County

B.D. Lee Elementary School

Bradlee Cooper, Physical Education, operational support.

Blacksburg High School

Misty Cobb Greene, High School Advancement Via Independent Determination (AVID), student field trips to tour college campuses.

Blacksburg Middle School

Jessica Anne Bowen, Science, classroom supplies and experiment kits for science lab classes.

Corinth Elementary School

April Smoak, Kindergarten, updated materials for her classroom library for reading and science.

Gaffney High School

Suzanne Key Crisp, English Language Arts with second language learners, interactive activities for students.

Betsy Cook Jolliff, AVID, for operational support for etiquette lessons, cooking lessons, fire safety and auto safety.

Traci Leshea Dill, Theatre Arts, portable stage platforms for traveling competitions.

Darin Pall, 11th Grade, cork boards to display students’ work.

Wendy D. Tindall, Forensic Science, crime analysis kits to create life-like crime scenes.

Institute of Innovation

Catherine Allen, High School Transition and Career Readiness, equipment for student-run specialty coffee shop.

Michael Mullinax, Welding teacher, 50 digital welding textbooks.

Northwest Elementary School

Jessica Ruffner, Language Arts, updated books for classroom library.

Spartanburg County

Clifdale Middle School

Ele L. Hill, Math, purchase of Scholastic Math magazines.

Amy E. Johnston, Music, purchase of tuners and contact mics for school band.

Daniel Morgan Technology Center

Jamey Thompson, Media Technology teacher, mobile light kits for video shoots.