An $8.4 million Investment into Community Schools
We are extremely excited and proud to announce that Communities in Schools of Pittsburgh-Allegheny County has received a Full-Service Community School grant from the U.S. Department of Education. The grant totals $8,454,492, with the funds being distributed over the next five years. This sum of money will allow us to advance our mission of empowering our local students.
What is a community school? A successful community school strategy creates a foundation of support, in school and beyond, to take on and break down barriers that limit student academic performance. All students in our community schools have equal access to our resources; we provide basic needs like food and clothing, trauma support, mentoring, and other community engagement.
A successful community school implementation:
improves student outcomes around attendance, behavior, and course performance
enhances student enrichment opportunities
improves school climate
Supports collaborative leadership
Improves the quality and availability of workforce development
Broadens employment opportunities.
With the money from this grant, we will expand our existing community school programs in Duquesne City School District, East Allegheny School District, South Allegheny School District, and Sto-Rox School District.
We also intend to grow our staff more than two-fold; we currently have 20 employees and will use a portion of the grant to support 30 more positions. We hope to increase in-school staff to all districts, add support to our homeless services department and provide training opportunities to school faculty so that they can better identify students who need support.
Community School Impacts
Over the last few years, CISPAC’s community school programs have had an incredible impact on the districts we serve. Across all districts in 2021, we helped students and families that were hit particularly hard by the COVID-19 pandemic. Our tangible resources, including free clothing stores, a vaccination van, food boxes, and essential hygiene products, totaled $128,770 going straight to the hands of those who need it most.
In 2021, CISPAC served 1470 students in Sto-Rox School District and collaborated with the district to form an anti-violence initiative. This is a district that, primarily in its junior and senior high schools, struggles with community violence on a regular basis. Our effort brings in 40 organizations and community advocates dedicated to making Sto-Rox a safer, more inviting place. Also, we are working to create safe passages to help people get to and from school safely. Giving students peace of mind as they travel to and from school is an essential way to keep attendance rates up.
We also hired two Homeless Resource Specialists in 2021 who are responsible for connecting housing-insecure families to resources that can help them find stable accommodations. In some schools in the CISPAC region, 10% of the student body faces housing insecurity. Even a short period of homelessness can turn students down paths that are hard to reverse, so prevention programming is essential. Our Homeless Research Specialists work upon CISPAC’s proven model of integrated student support, which deepens the ability to meet the most critical student needs.
These are just three examples of the crucial, result-driven work CISPAC is giving to the Pittsburgh-Allegheny region. We hope to expand these types of initiatives with the new money we are receiving from the FSCS grant, but it would not have been possible without supporters like you. With your help, we were able to grow our impact to its current status and prove to the Department of Education that we are worthy of more resources. Please join us in our mission today and donate so we can continue driving life-long outcomes for students that need our help. If our mission speaks to you, please consider working with us. View open positions here.