School-Business Partnerships
Rod Looney, Manager of Construction for Peoples Gas, often volunteers in classrooms at Marconi Community Academy, in Chicago.
School-business partnership help students learn about the world of work. At the same time, they help businesses learn about the promising young individuals they will someday have as customers and employees.
Marconi Community Academy
For 10 years, Peoples Gas has partnered with Guglielmo Marconi Community Academy. This K-8 school, with 325 students, is located on Chicago's west side. More than 90% of its students are at or below the poverty level.
Over time, Peoples Gas has provided the school with:
- Financial support for teachers' professional development
- Literacy curriculum enrichment materials
- Financial support for the in-school Marconi Chicago Children's Choir
- Connections to other community groups who deliver programs like anger management, arts programs, health services and education, tutoring programs, and crime prevention
- Computers and other equipment
- Employee-volunteers who read to third-graders and lead discussions about college
The partnership began as a way to help the school achieve progress for its students, parents and the surrounding communities. Now, this support has been credited with increasing the number of students performing at grade level by 18%. Reading and math scores have improved in every classroom.
For Peoples Gas Manager of Corporate Communications Richard Turner, learning from Marconi's students has been a personal benefit:
"Our partnership with Marconi is a wonderful two-way street. We've been able to support programs that raise test scores, enhance the students' self-esteem and provide professional help for teachers. At the same time, we've had the pleasure of getting to know the students and teachers. We've sat on the floor reading to the students, and we've watched them grow and achieve."
Franklin Middle School
Wisconsin Public Service and Franklin Middle School, in Green Bay, Wisconsin, are celebrating 20 years of partnering together for students. Franklin has 765 students; more than half of them qualify for low-income assistance.
Since 1988, employees have been sharing their experiences of work and the importance of education with the school's diverse student body.
At Wisconsin Public Service in Green Bay, Franklin Middle School art students showcase their work. The students learn that their art captures the attention and admiration of many.
It's one of the longest-lasting business-education partnerships in the Greater Green Bay area. Here are some examples of the partners' involvement:
- Franklin students visit Wisconsin Public Service, where they job-shadow employees for a day.
- Employees go to the school to teach special classes, including "Why Math Is Important, "Geography Days" and "The Economics of Staying in School."
- In December, Franklin's art students decorate an enormous "greeting card," which they give Wisconsin Public Service receive an enormous student-decorated "greeting card" from Franklin's art students. It's their way of thanking employees for their involvement.
- For a few weeks each spring, Franklin students' artwork is placed on display in a Wisconsin Public Service lunchroom. The exhibit is celebrated with a reception for students and parents. And several pieces of art are chosen to be framed and hung in the WPS office buildings until the following year.
The Franklin Middle School art show at Wisconsin Public Service began because the company and school believed it was important to showcase the students' art outside the school building.
Linda Jaworski-Pecht, the art teacher who has been behind the art show since it began, explains the art show offers students "a way to see their art through the eyes of someone besides their parents and teachers.
"It gives them a special environment for their art, because they get to leave the school campus and see their art in a professional way."