On January 26, PennCORD Regional Coordinator Rich Redmerski provided in-service training to Pittsburgh Public School teachers on the use of the outstanding national curriculum Project Citizen, one of PennCORD’s Keystone Programs. This week, the district will finalize stipend proposals for spring semester funding through PennCORD, an effort coordinated by school administrators Anita Ravi and Michael Dreger.

The partnership between the Pittsburgh Public Schools and PennCORD continues to thrive as this new round of stipends and in-service training move forward. In 2007 the twelve high schools in the district sought to enhance their 9^th grade civic education initiative, “Be the Change,” through the PennCORD partnership. During the first year of the partnership, stipends ranging from $600 to $3,000 were awarded in an effort to increase positive student engagement in their neighborhood communities and schools.  

Service learning projects were carried out with food banks, ethnic festivals, and recreation boards. Carrick High School students used an interdisciplinary approach involving the schools industrial arts, graphic arts and social studies departments to renovate a recreation facility. The project also included plans to maintain the site in future years.   

A number of schools focused on purchasing historical videos and books featuring the Pittsburgh area that they used for research involving the “Be the Change” curriculum. Some of those schools purchased video equipment, which will be used in future years to produce walking tour productions of their neighborhoods and also as tools for oral history projects.  

Westinghouse students focused their attention on beautification of a number of land parcels that surround the school. Later in the school year, a community social and education celebration was held on the cleared and planted sites.  These same students also conducted a poster contest with the theme “Reducing Community Violence.” Speakers were invited to the school to reinforce that message.