Portageville High School receives Monsanto grant for physics program

Front row from left are: Christina Brands, Physics First teacher, Jennifer Murphy, site quality and compliance manager for Monsanto, Jarrett Warren, Portageville School Board member; back row: Micah Rone and Ronnie Adams, Portageville School Board members.

MATTHEWS, Mo. -- Employees from Monsanto Matthews recommended Portageville High School to receive a $5,950 grant from the Monsanto Fund's 2016 site grant initiative.

"The grant will be used to purchase technology to bring our freshmen physics students into the 21st century," said Christina Brands, physics and chemistry teacher at Portageville High School. "Students will be able to utilize equipment they will see in college and the workplace."

Portageville High School previously received a Monsanto Fund site grant in 2013 ($10,000 for FFA program startup materials) and in 2014 ($5,000 for 20 classroom tablets).

"Portageville High School is proud of the academic programs, such as Physics First and the agricultural program, that we have been able to provide to our students with the help of Monsanto through it's grant programs," said Michael Allred, superintendent of the Portageville School District.

"Part of the Monsanto Fund mission is to provide educational support in farming communities that contributes to improvement of lives for those people and we wanted to support that opportunity for Portageville residents." said Barry Martin, U.S. pre-commercial soybean lead at Monsanto. "We're proud to support Portageville High School with this Monsanto Fund grant."

This year, the Monsanto Fund awarded more than $1.4 million to nonprofit organizations through its site grant initiative to help address essential needs in rural communities. Nonprofit organizations across the U.S. have received more than $7.5 million through this program over the last five years.