For Good

The latest Fred Forward Conference on June 3-5 -- run by the Fred Rogers Center for Early Learning and Children's Media at Saint Vincent College -- drew 160 people from major media companies and early childhood advocacy groups alike. "Just the perfect mix of folks for the discussions," says Rita Catalano, executive director of the Fred Rogers Center. "This was a national conference but it was a great opportunity to showcase the work that is happening in Pittsburgh."
 
Chief among its topic was the group's “Framework for Quality in Digital Media for Young Children,” two years in the making and still being built. There's so much media out there, but what's worthwhile for the youngest kids, up to 8 years old. Within a month, the Center hopes to take conference-generated ideas and develop them into "a very clear statement of what quality means," says Catalano. Participants also concluded that they need to help create new partnerships among child advocates and kids' media producers and find other opportunities to advance the quality of what's on offer.
 
Research on the subject, she adds, “is still very new, so we need to keep providing evidence that certain kinds of content, certain uses of content, works for children.” Creators of kids' media, from apps to new television shows, as well as childhood educators, also need new types of professional development.
           
Keynote speaker at this year's Fred Forward was Jerlean Daniel, executive director of the National Association for the Education of Young Children. “Jerlean reminded us," Catalano says, "that we need to always remember Fred Rogers’ message of always thinking of the children first.”
 
Do Good:
Advocate for early childhood education through the Pittsburgh Association for the Education of Young Children.
 
Writer: Marty Levine
Source: Rita Catalano, Fred Rogers Center

“Equal opportunity – that’s the American dream, right?" says Heather Harr, co-director of the Youth Media Advocacy Project (YMAP) at Carlow University. "But in fact the quality of education is different from school to school,” based on the socioeconomics and even the race of the local residents.
 
With looming state budget cuts in educational funding, students in the Racial Justice Through Human Rights group of the American Friends Service Committee, comprised of teens from public and private, city and suburban schools, have been gathering to talk about the differences they've discovered in everything from their school lunches to SAT preparation opportunities, field trips, lab equipment and lab courses, and extra-curricular activities.
 
“The students want to get their message out, particularly when there is a debate over funding for the budget cuts. They want leaders to see it …"
 
So the Racial Justice group contacted YMAP, whose participants are trained to help high-school students learn to navigate the media, thanks to funding from the Heinz Endowments.
 
The result, thus far, is the five-minute version of Education Justice in Pennsylvania, intended to be a half-hour movie, which the high-schoolers will be finishing over the summer. The film, even in preview form, is an effective vehicle for the students, who interview teachers, education policy advocates and classmates who testify emotionally but forcefully about the reduction in teachers and the closing of schools.
 
“The resources and the opportunities are very different from school to school,” concludes Harr. “It’s not equal-opportunity education.”
 
Do Good: 
Stay abreast of the latest Pennsylvania education reform news, and how you can get involved, via the Education Policy Leadership Center.
 
Writer: Marty Levine
Source: Heather Harr, Youth Media Advocacy Project

KidsPlay is back in Market Square for summer Tuesday mornings, 10-11:30 a.m., through August 21. It’s a free program of the Pittsburgh Downtown Partnership (PDP), and spokesperson Brooke M. Fornalczyk says this year’s arts, safety, cultural and environmental activities for kids and families are even more diverse and interactive than in the previous five years.
 
Also new this year is the Carnegie Library’s Reading Room, happening at the same time. Kids and their caregivers can step over to the mobile library branch and select a new book for just $1-$2.
 
Fornalczyk says the PDP expects 2,400-3,000 children and their families over the 12-week program – that’s 200-250 people each Tuesday, so kids visiting from local daycares and homes will have lots of company in the revamped Market Square. The Square offers many eateries, too, of course, and free nearby T rides to the North Shore. It’s what Fornalczyk calls “the centerpiece and jewel of Downtown Pittsburgh … the perfect destination to host KidsPlay.”
 
If your kids are older, but still kids, you’ll want to help celebrate the success of the Pittsburgh Promise, whose four-year, $40,000 college scholarships for qualified Pittsburgh Public Schools (PPS) students have now helped 3,200 kids, about 400 of whom have just become the first Promise recipients to graduate from college.
 
Raising Pittsburgh’s Promise Gala on June 14 will feature keynote speaker Sasha Heinz of the Heinz Endowments, while Igniting The Promise Charity Concert and Dance-A-Thon at Stage AE later that night – lasting until dawn the next morning -- will honor the first Promise-assisted college grads and all the high-school grads with performances by Ashanti, G. Love and Special Sauce, DJ Bonics and DJ Zimmie, ending with a sunrise reggae barbecue.
 
Both events will be fundraisers, of course, as well as parties. "It is a pinnacle point in the life of the Promise,” says Lauren Bachorski, the organization’s special projects coordinator. "It's an ultimate opportunity for us to thank all our supporters so far."
 
It’s also a chance, she adds, for the public to realize again how the Promise is encouraging PPS graduates to stay and work in Pittsburgh – and should encourage families to send their kids to PPS for the scholarship opportunity.
 
Writer: Marty Levine
Sources: Brooke M. Fornalczyk, Pittsburgh Downtown Partnership; Lauren Bachorski, Pittsburgh Promise

"We think kids and families need an alternative to what is currently available on the radio" all day, says Larry Berger, whose SLB Radio Productions, Inc. produces the long-running Saturday Light Brigade each week. "There really is not a PBS-type approach or a Saturday Light Brigade-type approach that engages children and adults in a way that is fun to listen to, that is educational and informative."
 
That's why Berger and Jennifer Stancil, WQED's executive director of educational partnerships, will be co-directing a newly announced collaborative effort called iQ Kids Radio, which aims to eventually offer 24 hours of innovative, family-oriented kids' radio programming.
 
Right now it's an idea whose time has come, says Berger -- and an idea that was chosen this week as the local Junior League's signature project for the next three years. That comes with a $45,000 grant and, even more importantly, Berger says, the expertise and volunteer energy of the several hundred women who are members of League chapter.

Stancil says iQ Kids Radio content will first concentrate on building from the Saturday Light Brigade to fill an entire Saturday of programming, since that's when parents are listening with their kids most often. The collaborative’s early ideas for programming feature storytelling, language lessons, music and children's literature, kitchen chemistry and other areas that attract both kids and parents and help children become successful.
 
One idea is to adapt PBS television content for the radio, since much of its kids' programming centers on music and songs anyway. "We ask ourselves on a daily basis," she says, "are we maximizing the content we get from PBS to help kids prepare for kindergarten and for life?"
 
"There's a legacy of high-quality programs," notes Berger. "That really would make a lot of sense listening with your family as you drive, or listening on a smart phone." iQ Kids Radio may end up as an app that families can subscribe to, as a traditional radio service supported by underwriting, or as "something they haven't even thought of yet," he says.
 
The task, says Stancil, is to figure out what innovative children's radio sounds like and to get it into schools, museums and other venues, as well as homes. In surveys, she adds, WQED has found that parents are particularly uncomfortable picking educational media for their kids. WQED and SLB hope the new iQ Kids Radio puts them, together, in the perfect position to help.

Do Good:
Connect with others via Pittsburgh's Kids+Creativity Network, formulate ideas for iQ Kids Radio, and let WQED or SLB know your best ideas.
 
Writer: Marty Levine
Sources: Larry Berger, SLB Radio, and Jennifer Stancil, WQED

The 2012 Design, Art and Technology (DATA) Awards from the Pittsburgh Technology Council will feature many firsts, including the public debut for Donora native J Moses' WeChi, which he calls a " social feedback network."
 
The awards, June 7 at the North Side's Grande Hall at the Priory, will include an interactive exhibition as well as tweet-driven “People’s Choice Awards.” Up for recognition this year is everyone from big players such as PPG Industries, Schell Games, the Fred Rogers Company and Bossa Nova Robotics to some fresh creative media from Pop City's own Jennifer Baron (with Keith Tassick).
 
Moses -- former head of BMG Interactive, MTV Russia and UGO Entertainment -- says he is bringing WeChi to Pittsburgh both in recognition of his origins and because the emoticon was invented here 30 years ago. The new social network is "built out of the concept of capturing empathy online," he says. Essentially, WeChi rewards people for empathetic behavior. Being a great friend to others on WeChi lets users earn points. Collectively, those points translate into real money that can be given to good causes.
 
Rather than focusing on what we're doing, this social network is intended to record how we are doing -- turning "the emotional intent behind what you're doing [into] energy," Moses says.
 
Apart from the social network, he sees the same WeChi algorithms helping veterans with PTSD support one another, or aiding patients and doctors, parents and schools, and kids on sports teams stay connected in more meaningful ways.
 
While Moses admits the top draw for his visit is a bit of home cooking at his aunt's house in Donora, he believes this year's DATA nominees represent "a terrific collection of new products and a lot of creative talent in Pittsburgh."
 
Writer: Marty Levine
Source: J Moses

Four 12-year-old Evans City Middle Schoolers won one of 17 youth prizes -- from a field of 3,700 entries -- for their game, Archers vs. Aliens, in this year's National STEM Video Game Challenge.
 
And they had fun doing it, too, their parents say.
 
The White House-inspired contest, designed to encourage learning in science, technology, engineering and math, gave the kids new laptops with educational and game-design software, $2,000 to send to their favorite charity, a cool ceremony at a Smithsonian museum -- and months of design work leading up to the game's completion.
 
"There were many weekends," says Lori Schexnaildre, mother of Connor, part of the winning team with Campbell Kriess, Justin Bicehouse and Drew McCarron. "They worked at it diligently. They really worked together as a team. They had a good time doing it, which was the best thing about it.
 
"I played it," she adds. "It is really well put together." Designed to encourage math learning in 8-year-olds, it awards archers with more arrows to shoot from atop their castle the more equations they answer correctly, allowing them to fight off approaching aliens. Miss the math answers and the archers eventually run out of arrows.
 
"It certainly help[ed] Drew explore what his interests are and what he might see himself doing professionally someday," says mother Kelly McCarron. "He has expressed a desire to explore the engineering and design fields," although it's still a bit early to settle on a career, she cautions.
 
Campbell Kriess's mom Elana says her son is already set on being a game designer and programmer. "This basically validated for him everything he wants to do in his future," she says, while also serving as a great learning experience. "Working with his peers was challenging: dealing with scheduling issues, differences of opinion, et cetera, were all good lessons. And he is also learning about the business side of video game design -- he is now selling the game online and had to learn about how to market it, process payments [and] being customer-friendly, et cetera."
 
Crucial to the early stages of this learning experience was the training workshop run by WQED in January (since PBS and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting are contest sponsors), which half the winning Evans City team attended. The workshop began with training by another contest sponsor, E-Line Media, in GameStar Mechanic, their free game-designing platform, and continued with lessons in how to increase kids' math literacy through games, as well as gaming principles, from rule-changing to storyboarding and using paper prototypes.
 
"Making a game isn't just about the digital programming -- it's about the narrative behind it," notes Jennifer Stancil, executive director of educational partnerships for WQED.
 
The day continued at Carnegie Mellon University's Entertainment Technology Center, where the kids walked into the middle of a 48-hour game-building challenge for adults called the Global Game Jam. Game Jammers mentored the children by exposing them to new games under development.
 
"We will be a game institute to facilitate more of this" training for middle schoolers in the future, says Stancil, referring to WQED's new Game ON! Institute. "I hope the boys come back and be mentors for the new kids who are trying to win the contest."
 
Writer: Marty Levine
Sources: Lori Schexnaildre; Kelly McCarron; Elana Kriess; Jennifer Stancil, WQED

Teaming an art museum and a kids’ trauma center is “a very novel collaboration … very different and very new," says Dr. Anthony Mannarino, director of the Center for Traumatic Stress in Children and Adolescents at Allegheny General Hospital, which is beginning a pilot program with the Andy Warhol Museum.
 
The Center already uses psychotherapy to treat kids with PTSD, and the Warhol currently uses art to aid kids with autism at the Wesley Spectrum Highland School. Now the two institutions will add art making and teaching about art to the therapy regimen of some of the Center’s patients to see how that can help. The lessons will focus on recognizing the true expressions on people’s faces, which can be a problem for traumatized children.
 
"About 40 percent of all children by age 16 have been exposed to a traumatic event of one type or another, and probably a sizable percentage of those kids have some post-traumatic stress disorder symptoms," Mannarino explains. "It's an adaptive thing to do to see anger on someone's face before they're going to hit you, to keep you out of those situations … But after, it is not adaptive," when faces that show neutral, mixed or even positive expressions can be misinterpreted and cause unnecessary anxiety.
 
The Warhol will employ Andy Warhol’s film portraits, dubbed Screen Tests, which feature the famous and the then-unknown, who were told to sit still but nonetheless display a variety of emotions on screen. The museum will also use the photo-booth studies Warhol used as inspiration. In addition, the kids learn to create sculpture and stop-motion animation.
 
Teams from both institutions have begun training each other in their own specialties this month. The pilot program will attempt to gauge whether and how the art component helps -- in particular, whether it helps children who are hardest to reach through psychotherapy.
 
"We want [kids] to have a positive experience that helps them be in the moment," says Tresa Varner, curator of education and interpretation at the Warhol. “Hopefully, just having the experience is beneficial, and is a respite from the world."

Do Good:
Sign a child up now for inspiring art classes at the Pittsburgh Center for the Arts.
 
Writer: Marty Levine
Sources: Anthony Mannarino, Center for Traumatic Stress in Children and Adolescents; Tresa Varner, Andy Warhol Museum

Last year, Ben Weaver was part of a pioneering program begun by Google and run by AmeriCorps and Pittsburgh Cares. He and two others were hired to help 33 local nonprofits assess their technology needs and create a plan to use technology more efficiently and effectively.

The program worked so well, says Weaver, that a fresh team is being recruited to help more local nonprofits improve their technology use. (Use the two-step application process here and here.)
 
Called HandsOn Tech VISTA, the program helps nonprofits take better advantage of everything from printers to database management. Weaver says team members also recruit local volunteers to make nonprofits' tech plans a reality, and hold workshops on better tech use for an even larger group of nonprofits. Team members start the program at Google HQ in Mountain View, California, where they meet with the nonprofit arms of LinkedIn, Facebook, and other charitable tech companies.
 
"Almost all the nonprofits we reviewed," Weaver says, "could use a revision to their website, or a replacement. There is also a large need for data management -- from member tracking for human services organizations to crime tracking for some of the community development organizations. Just having a technology plan that they can use going forward tends to be valuable to them."
 
Team members get a biweekly living allowance, health insurance and educational benefits from joining. And Weaver says a tech background isn't necessarily a requirement for applicants. He spent three years doing tech support in Shadyside's Apple store, but his fellow team members have marketing and political science backgrounds.  

Do Good:
Trying to find the right nonprofit to help all by yourself? Click on Pittsburgh Gives for a helpful guide.

Writer: Marty Levine
Source: Ben Weaver, HandsOn Tech VISTA

Local schools were challenged back in November by The Marcus L. Ruscitto Charitable Foundation to get creative when it comes to anti-bullying education, and Propel Homestead’s winning effort leads a slate of videos designed to show kids how pervasive bullying is, and how they can start to combat it.
 
Propel’s video features students speaking directly to their peers about bullying situations that may not be obvious or gain other kids’ attention, such as sending harassing messages via text or social media. This increasingly common bullying method “is less intrusive to others and those who are being bullied … so it's harder to detect,” says foundations spokesperson Jonathan H. Rosenson. “They're trying to raise awareness -- if this is happening to you, tell someone."
 
The Propel students in the video also display posters with surprising statistics, showing, for instance, that one in four students is bullied during his or her pre-college school career, and "even more surprising, one out of every five students admits to being a bully," Rosenson says. "Almost half of kids are afraid of being harassed while they're in the [school] bathroom.
 
"We felt this type of approach would be very well received by the other kids in their school district," he adds, earning Propel Homestead the top prize of the day-long “Bullyproofing Your School” program in the fall of 2012, presented by Dr. Adolph Brown. Brown also has his own story to tell of being bullied and finding a solution.
 
Other winners of $2,000 each were Hyde Elementary in Moon Township School District, Highland Middle School in the Blackhawk district and the Belle Vernon Area High School. Moon’s McCormick Elementary and Penn Trafford Middle School each won $500.
 
Each of the schools will hold video screenings of the winning submissions and check award presentations at assemblies during the next several weeks.
 
Do Good:
Need anti-bullying resources at home? Check out the Carnegie Library’s page about teen violence, abuse and bullying page.

Writer: Marty Levine
Source: Jonathan H. Rosenson, The Marcus L. Ruscitto Charitable Foundation

Here's an implausible short story: One day, Deanna M. Mulye of the North Side heard about Awesome Pittsburgh, which awards $1,000 every month to the most awesome proposed local project.
 
Better come up with an idea, thought Mulye. How about a device -- let's call it the Exquisite Machine -- that will travel to many locations throughout the city for people to type in a line that strikes their fancy. A short time later, into their mailboxes will pop a finished tale, with their line as the beginning.
 
The idea isn't entirely implausible, since Mulye already works as a writing teacher at Lincoln Park Performing Arts Charter School in Beaver County.
 
What makes it a tad fictional, even awesome, is that Mulye is still figuring out what the device will look like, how it will collect our lines and where it will go. She sees something with a “typewritery interface,” perhaps a bit of steam punk, its cogs and gears meshing seamlessly with the modern.
 
The rest is in final draft: Young writers from among her students, as well as groups recruited for the task, will complete the stories, which will whizz back to their first-line authors via good old-fashioned surface mail.
 
“People who contribute their sentences, just walking down the street, I’m hoping they forget they’ve done it, and then this magical little envelope will appear in their mailbox,” Mulye says. She pictures the stories pinned up on walls or stashed in a drawer to be re-discovered later -- something less likely with an emailed story.
 
BatCat Press – the small publishing company she started with her students at Lincoln Park, which puts out two titles a year in limited, handmade editions -- will publish some of the stories.
 
One hint: Don't type in "Many years later, as he faced the firing squad, Colonel Aureliano Buendia was to remember that distant afternoon when his father took him to discover ice" and expect to receive One Hundred Years of Solitude in return. Mulye envisions flash fictions from all these opening lines. And she hopes to offer writing workshops in other schools and at camps, based on the experience.
 
“It’s giving a writing project to the city,” she muses. “And it sprang from the idea that everyone has a story to tell – or thinks they have inside of them the Great American Novel.”
 
Writer: Marty Levine
Sources: Deanna M. Mulye, Gabriel Garcia Marquez

There are so many free, outdoor activities at the 26th Annual Pittsburgh International Children’s Festival May 16-20 in Oakland, from storytelling to dance and magic, that “some people miss that it’s a theater festival at its heart,” says Pamela K. Lieberman, the festival’s executive director.
 
Lieberman is hoping that one festival event in particular inspires patrons to try some of the ticketed theater performances. Artist Alan Parkinson is back with another Luminarium, called Mirazozo – a colorful, football field-sized inflated light labyrinth. The experience of being inside this structure, she says, could “help inspire audiences to see something [else] that is in a more traditional theater setting.”
 
They include “Plop!” by Australia’s Windmill Theatre, a play about a courageous rabbit, the unpleasant Plop and the fear of the unknown, geared to the very youngest children, ages 1 to 5. “Children are ready to see theater when they are that small,” says Lieberman, but “it’s a new aspect of the field,” and parents may not yet understand how their kids can benefit from, and enjoy, theater as preschoolers.
 
Other theatrical features are World of Rhythm by Netherlands’ Drums United, featuring percussion from across the globe; Dudes, described as a “mix of song, dance, juggling, puppetry and slap-stick comedy” for 6-year-olds and up, also from the Netherlands; Scotland’s Shona Reppe Puppets performing Cinderella; and Origami Tales from Kuniko Theater, whose folded paper creations are part of Japanese storytelling.
 
The free activities encompass everything from last year’s Silent Disco (offering kids headphones that pick up several DJs) to a hula-hoop maker and interactive demonstrations by artists who have won the Sprout Fund’s Spark Awards for innovative ideas at the intersection of the arts and technology aimed at children.
 
“Our mission … is that the children are seeing culture and art from around the world, and walking away with new ideas and creative inspiration,” says Lieberman. “It’s really important that families are experiencing this together. We’re now seeing the third generation come through as audience members, so it’s really exciting.”

The Pittsburgh International Children's Festival is a production of the Pittsburgh Cultural Trust.
 
Do Good:
Join the Kids+Creativity network for the latest on the intersection of education, arts and technology – and to lend your own talents.

Writer: Marty Levine
Source: Pamela K. Lieberman, Pittsburgh International Children’s Festival

The Pittsburgh Promise scholarship fund for Pittsburgh Public Schools students is celebrating its first year of awarding $40,000 to qualified seniors – twice the scholarship level of previous years – with four events across three weekends: community-service days, a career fair, a dance marathon fundraiser and a gala.
 
First up is the community-service weekend.
 
On May 31, seniors who are eligible to receive the scholarship and graduate – potentially 1,100 district students – will be fanning out across the city to participate in up to 40 different service projects selected by Pittsburgh Cares.
 
“We wanted [students] to have the opportunity to say thank you to the city,” says Gene Walker, the Promise’s benchmarks manager, “and to start their life of volunteering.” Also participating that day will be students who are enrolled in the Promise’s Community College of Allegheny County extension program, which is in its third year. This program helps students who showed potential to be Promise-ready when they graduated from high school but weren’t eligible for the Promise at the time, due to a low grade-point average or other factor. If participants get through the highly structured extension program at CCAC, they become eligible for the Promise for their remaining three years of college.
 
Volunteering on June 1 will be some of the 3,200 current college students and graduates who received the Promise scholarship in previous years.
 
The upcoming service weekend will be followed by a “Career Launch” career fair June 7-8, aimed at the 400 college grads who have received the Promise, as well as those who haven’t graduated yet but who could use help with resumes and interview preparation.
 
The dance marathon June 14-15 at Sunrise Stage AE will feature performances by Ashanti and G. Love and Special Sauce and DJs, and will be hosted by Kiya and Mike Tomlin, with proceeds going to the Promise. 
 
Just as the Promise is designed to aid the academic achievements of students while keeping them in or near Pittsburgh, these celebratory events are “our way of getting [students] out there and hooked into Pittsburgh, whether it’s for a job or volunteering,” concludes Walker.
 
Writer: Marty Levine
Source: Gene Walker, Pittsburgh Promise

Even though clean energy sources like wind and solar are everywhere, there are particularly Burgh-ish reasons to switch to them, says Tiffany Hickman, Western Pennsylvania outreach coordinator for Citizens for Pennsylvania’s Future (or PennFuture) – and reasons not to doubt their usefulness.
 
“We have cloudy days here and a lot of people think that solar is not a viable energy here,” notes Hickman. Actually, she says, many local solar suppliers are getting “great results” from solar energy installations. “Wind is becoming a big thing in Pennsylvania in general,” she adds, and people throughout the state may not realize that, thanks to electricity deregulation, they can now choose to purchase 100-percent wind-powered electricity from certain companies.
 
That’s why PennFuture is holding the final part of their FutureFest, called “Clean Energy Matters,” on May 24 at the Phipps Conservatory. The event is geared to homeowners who want to know more about their options, students who are interested in learning more about sustainable technologies, and people in the energy industry.
 
Main presenter Andrea Luecke of the national Solar Foundation, which promotes sun-powered energy through education and research, will present the latest perspectives on solar use and how its implementation is getting past recent hurdles.
 
Local presenters include Tony Prelec of Pepco Energy Services, who will discuss the hot topics of thermal storage and landfill methane; Frank Bursic of Rentricity, who will talk about hydrokinetic energy recovery (capturing the energy created by water rushing through our pipes); and Katie Belessa of EverPower Wind, who wants you to buy local wind.
 
“It’s part of a sustainable future for Pennsylvania,” Hickman says. “Pennsylvania can be a very strong purveyor of wind here and set a standard for the rest of the country.”
 
Do Good:
Learn more about the environmental needs specific to our region at the Frick Environmental Center.

Writer: Marty Levine
Source: Tiffany Hickman, PennFuture

Everything seems to be happening at once in May, so get ready:
 
The kickoff for Great Outdoors Week is May 9 in Market Square, with a climbing wall, raffles and more – just the start of 60 events in more than a week, lasting through May 20, from a medicinal plant walk and bird-watching hike to a bicycling event involving the Over the Bar Café on the South Side. Highlights include the three signature GOW events: Learn to Row and Paddle (on May 11, with the Three Rivers Rowing Association); National Bike to Work Day/Car Free Fridays (on May 18, with Bike Pittsburgh), and the May 19 Venture Outdoors Festival (sponsored by Highmark Blue Cross Blue Shield).
 
Enjoy Pittsburgh’s outdoor amenities while you can, says Ginette Walker Vinski, spokesperson for Sustainable Pittsburgh, lest the state assembly votes yes on the governor’s budget cuts to the Keystone Recreation, Park and Conservation Fund. "This is Pennsylvania's only funding source that directs funds to parks, land trusts and recreation." Vinski points out. In the past, it has supported the Three Rivers Heritage and Montour trails, along with amenities at state parks and forests, including visitor centers, parking lots and rest rooms.
 
The 30^th annual YWCA Tribute to Women Leadership Awards Luncheon () on May 16 this year is honoring eight women for their contribution to the local YWCA’s mission of empowering women and eliminating racism. They include the Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh’s Jane Werner; Heidi K. Bartholomew of FedEx Ground; the FISA Foundation’s Missy Unkovic; Donna L. Imhoff of CCAC; Helen A. Davis of Davis Eye and Wellness Center; Jeannette E. South-Paul, chair of the Department of Family Medicine at Pitt’s School of Medicine; Susan Frietsche of the Women’s Law Project; and Christy Uffelman of Mascaro Construction Company
 
"What we look for,” says Maggie Jensen, CEO of the YWCA of Pittsburgh, “are women with professional accomplishments but also volunteerism -- that they contribute to the community above and beyond what they do professionally."
 
Equality Pennsylvania is having its first fundraiser in Southwestern Pennsylvania on the evening of May 10, celebrating two years of statewide accomplishment on behalf of LGBT Pennsylvanians.
 
Executive Director Ted Martin points to several important accomplishments since 2010, including the passage of 12 local non-discrimination ordinances that make it illegal to fire or deny public accommodations to someone because he or she is LGBT; the founding of the LGBT Equality Caucus in Harrisburg, which Martin believes may be the first in a state legislature; and the group’s support for LGBT candidates through the Equality PA PAC.
 
Locally, Martin is also pleased to see the Pirates release an “It Gets Better” video recently as part of the campaign to encourage kids not to be bullied by anti-LGBT attitudes. Still, he notes that 70 percent of Pennsylvanians remain uncovered by nondiscrimination laws, which the group is working to rectify. "So much of what we do is letting people understand who we are, what we are doing … and why we are doing it," Martin says.
 
Finally, don’t forget that May 13 is Mother’s Day. Through mom’s day (and from June 2-17 for Father’s Day too), you can head to SLB Radio Productions at the Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh to have your kids make their own Audio CD Cards, complete with handmade decorations. Last year, more than 500 kids ages 5 and up preserved their voices and sentiments for mom.
 
Writer: Marty Levine
Sources: Ginette Walker Vinski, Sustainable Pittsburgh; Maggie Jensen, YWCA of Pittsburgh; Ted Martin, Equality Pennsylvania; SLB Radio Productions

For 25 years, Manchester Craftsmen’s Guild has displayed and celebrated student art from Pittsburgh Public Schools. But for the newly dubbed MCG Invitational, opening on May 10, the pioneering arts-education organization will also be including art from students in five suburban school districts – West Mifflin, Wilkinsburg, Duquesne, Homestead and McKeesport – who will join in the competition for more than $100,000 in scholarships, awards and prizes.
 
“We are glad to have the chance to regionalize” the event, says Dave Deily, director of MCG Youth & Arts. "The regionalization has helped with drawing a high level of art in all mediums. This is one of the strongest shows we've had."
 
The show’s entries incorporate drawings, watercolors, oils, charcoals, ceramics (both sculptural and functional), textiles, photography, printmaking, and mixed media, including a large-scale hanging piece made from at least 1,000 Port Authority bus passes.
 
Alecia Shipman, who attended MCG classes from 2000 through 2002 while a student at Schenley High School, remembers winning the Eleanor Friedberg Art Scholarship (via The Pittsburgh Foundation) for her ceramics. Her MCG art portfolio got her into Alfred University, where she earned a BFA in sculpture. She subsequently became a certified teacher and taught art, then received a Master of Art Management degree from Carnegie Mellon University. Today she is cultivation manager for downtown’s August Wilson Center, running their educational programs, including those in the arts.
 
The MCG experience, Shipman says, “gave me an appreciation for what art can mean for a person who is in such a critical time in their lives. It was a chance for people to have such positive role models in their lives, both extra-curricular and academic.
 
"There's a lot of things you can do after 3:00" while in high school, she notes – some of which can get kids in trouble. "It gave me an opportunity to do something productive with my spare time. That ultimately prepared me for my future in the arts."
 
The MCG Invitational Awards Reception begins at 6 p.m. on May 10 at MCG. The exhibit of student art is open for two weeks.
 
Writer: Marty Levine
Sources: Dave Deily, MCG; Alecia Shipman