Portland nonprofit Spurwink lands $20M education grant
Spurwink, a Portland-based nonprofit that provides behavioral health and educational services for children, adults and families, has won a five-year, $20 million U.S. Department of Education grant that it will use to expand a program that improves high school academic achievement.
“Spurwink is really pleased to be able to provide the fundamental organizational and fiscal services necessary to scale up this very effective BARR [Building Assets, Reducing Risks] model,” Spurwink President and CEO Eric Meyers said in a news release. “In Maine, the BARR model benefits from the ongoing behavioral health supports that Spurwink provides in public schools, helping students develop their social and emotional skills and engage more fully in learning.”
Spurwink’s BARR model aims to help educators connect with their students and promote student engagement and has demonstrated significant results in increasing credits and standardized tests scores for students in historically low-performing schools.
Spurwink plans to expand the BARR program to an additional 161 schools. The grant will also support a randomized, controlled trial of the BARR model in 66 low-performing schools, the nonprofit said.
Spurwink, which is based at 901 Washington Ave. in the Cumberland County city, provides behavioral health and education services for children, adults and families. Founded in 1960, it currently has 37 homes serving children and another 18 for adults. It has nearly 1,000 employees. In 2015, Spurwink had revenue of $54.3 million and expenses of $51.2 million, according to its annual report.
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