David Blair, president of Kingfisher Educational Foundation, was the featured speaker of the Kingfisher Rotary club last week.

With the assistance of KEF Vice President Sara Garrett, he narrated a PowerPoint presentation which provided the history and current objectives and projects of KEF.

KEF was founded in 1985 with Arrell Reed, Jack Harrell, Barry Bollenbach, Gary Boxley, Richard Reynolds, Virginia Hellwege and Jim Beall among the founding board members.

Blair said the original fundraising project was the Rockin’ Boppin’ Concert, a talent show that was very successful during it’s time.

That was followed up with the current Duck Race which began in 1999. Since that beginning, the

Since that beginning, the KEF, a non-profit 501(c) tax deductible organization, has raised over $700,000 in funds managed by the Community Foundation Oklahoma and the OKC Community Foundation.

KEF provides grants each year to provide financial support to Kingfisher Public Schools classrooms.

Blair said the mission was to assist classroom teachers by investing in students by enriching learning inside and outside the classrooms, resulting in overall educational excellence.

He said one of the goals of KEF was to grow endowments to reach the $1 million mark by 2025.

Blair said that in 2020, KEF awarded $30,000 in teacher grants and the KPS administration awarded an additional $15,000 during that grant cycle.

Blair then asked Kingfisher Heritage School Librarian Kathy Kadavy to speak about the book vending machine her library was awarded in 2019.

She explained that school children were given tokens to place in the machine, which is filled with current suitable “cool” books for children.

These books are prizes awarded for reading 50,000, 100,000 and 1 million words.

She said to date, nine students have read over 1 million words, with several more currently close to that amount, and two students have read over 1.5 million words.

Blair said the Duck Race is held each July 4 at the Vernie Snow Aquatic Center, with all proceeds going to teachers and teacher grants.

Last year, he said, a record 500 ducks were sold, raising a total of $25,000.

Other current board members include Vaynna Borelli, John Storm, Brooke Bollenbach, Jeff Johnson, Jeff Wilcox, Mellissa Mecklenburg, Zac Kannady, Chad Bragg and Joe Voth.

The program was arranged for by Jeff Johnson, Kingfisher Rotarian and KEF board member.