RHS Teacher's Creative Research Gets Major Boost

VERNON, CT — Fund for Teachers, one of the nation's leading organizations supporting pre-K through 12 educators, has announced its 2025 grant recipients — including 65 Connecticut teachers and one from Vernon.

With the support of Dalio Education, the teachers will leverage approximately $250,000 into "learning for themselves, their students and school communities. The organization.

Brian Forte, a veteran teacher at Rockville High Schoo, has received a fellowship for research in Portugal that traces origins of the trans-Atlantic slave trade and how it became a blueprint for the American slave trade and how the U.S. has made a concerted effort to confront its past through government programs and education. The fellowship was funded through the support of the Dalio Foundation and the Maxwell/Hanrahan Foundation.

Click here to view the full list of Fund for Teachers’ 2025 Connecticut grant recipients.

Since 2001, Fund for Teachers has "invested" $39 million in 10,225 teachers from across the United States. This year, Fund for Teachers awarded a total of $1.625 million in grants to bolster 357 teachers’ self-designed fellowships in 79 countries on six continents.

Click here to view the full list of 2025 Fund for Teachers grant recipients.

Fund for Teachers annually invites teachers’ proposals that address learning gaps for themselves and their students. Since 2015, Barbara Dalio and Dalio Education have partnered with Fund for Teachers to invest $4.9 million in grants for 1,135 Connecticut teachers.

"Teachers are at the heart of shaping not only students' academic trajectories, but often their social and emotional well-being, as well,” Executive Director Karen Eckhoff said. "Fund for Teachers believes this high calling merits validation and support, which we provide by funding fellowships that ultimately inspire teachers’ enthusiasm for student engagement and extend their longevity in the profession."

Dalio Education founder and CEO Barbara Dalio said, "It never ceases to amaze me the learning opportunities teachers seek to bring to their students."