Press Release - Announcement

Hall of Fame in line for federal funding

By Scott Rochat
The Emporia Gazette

The U.S. House of Representatives has approved $150,000 for the National Teachers Hall of Fame, U.S. Rep. Jerry Moran, R-Kan, announced this morning in Emporia.

If approved by the Senate and signed by President George W. Bush, the $150,000 would be the first federal funding ever received by the Emporia-based Hall of Fame. Moran said it was important for Congress to reach out to teachers, particularly at a time when federal regulations had made their job more difficult than ever.

“What we do in Washington is very minuscule, a small thing,” Moran said to an audience at Emporia State University’s Visser Hall, the home of the Hall of Fame. “What a teacher does in the life of a child is a huge thing. So the Teachers Hall of Fame is something I’m honored and delighted to support.”

The announcement comes at a time when the hall recently lost one of its corporate sponsors. For the past three years, the hall of fame has gotten a combined $60,000 to $70,000 from Sodexho, The New York Times and Pearson Education, but Sodexho recently withdrew its support so it could focus instead on world hunger.

“To operate effectively as a Hall of Fame, our budget needs to be about $150,000 a year,” said ESU President Michael Lane. “To operate as a Hall of Fame and a teacher development agency requires about $350,000. ... (This announcement) will take a great deal of pressure off of all of us.”

The National Teachers Hall of Fame was established in Emporia in 1989 and inducted its first members in 1992. It now has 80 members, including Emporia teacher Carol Strickland. Teachers must have at least 20 years experience to be considered for the hall.

Last year, the hall of fame left its original home on C of E Drive and moved into smaller quarters in Visser Hall.

Following Moran’s announcement, the hall of fame’s public relations director Glen Strickland formally announced the hall’s new “One in a Million” campaign. The campaign encourages Americans to donate at least $1 to the hall in the name of a teacher who has changed a person’s life.

Strickland himself gave the first $100 for the campaign in honor of Jack Gregory, his old debate coach in Muskogee, Okla. Gregory has since retired to Arizona.

Those seeking more information on the Hall of Fame or the campaign can call 341-5660.

Lane said the board of directors also was considering ways to give the hall greater national exposure, such as establishing a “virtual hall of fame” on its Web site with video clips of new inductees. At present, he said, the hall gets about 250 visitors a year, most of those during the week when new members are inducted.