BEDFORD — The Bedford Education Foundation has announced its grant recipients for 2012, awarding $10,580 to seven scholastic initiatives from the elementary to high school levels.

“We don’t fund things that we believe should be in the budget,” said the BEF’s Treasurer Paul Brock. Those things include equipment, construction and capital improvement.

“We believe those things are the purview of the voters and the taxpayers in town,” he said. “We are looking for the above and beyond kind of things, the programs, the workshops and the advanced learning teachers are willing to go make an investment in.”

Kate Schoedinger, a reading specialist at Lurgio Middle School, received a grant to bring author Katy Grant to the school in early June. Grant, whose teen mystery novel “Hide and Seek” was assigned across the entire district to staff and student alike, led a three-day writer’s workshop before presenting at an all-school meeting.

Bedford High School counselors Zanna Blaney and Kristie Torbick received funds to hold a BASE (Bedford Academic and Social Education) Camp this summer, intended to soften the transition into high school.

Brock said counselors “can nominate certain students that they believe could benefit from the BASE camp to ease the introduction of these eighth graders into the scary world of the high school.”

The BEF detailed the beneficiaries of the grants in a recent press release.

High school reading specialists Linda Pomeroy and Maureen Lipari received a grant to attend a Reading Plus program; Abigail Bergen at McKelvie Intermediate School will attend a Learning Disabilities Association international conference; Elinor Schwartz, a librarian at Memorial Elementary, will attend the Institute on the Teaching of Reading; and second grade teacher Deborah Sinamark at Memorial Elementary will participate in a Diagnosis and Remediation of Learning in Math workshop.

Finally, teachers Zanna Blaney and Kristie Torbick will implement Challenge Day, an anti-bullying program at the high school.

“(Challenge Day is) intended to make kids somewhat more sensitive to what’s going on in the hearts and minds of their peers and make them a little bit more sensitive to the concerns and fears these kids might have,” Brock explained.

Grantees are expected to share what they learn with their colleagues with as many students as possible.

The BEF awards between $10,000 and $15,000 annually. To date, more than $80,000 has been awarded by the BEF.

Though this money comes from donations, the group is aiming to raise a $500,000 endowment, the profit from which would finance future grants without the need to fundraise. At $125,000, a quarter of that amount has already been raised.

An evening with Bedford native Seth Meyers raised $53,000 for the BEF.

Established in 2006, the nonprofit BEF is comprised of a 13-member Board of Directors who volunteer their time to support academic excellence in Bedford’s public schools.

“We fund those extraordinary items that take good education and move it to the level of extraordinary education,” Brock said.

For more information visit www.befnh.org.

srios@newstote.com