The lack of opportunity for social enrichment activities for people with developmental disabilities often results in loneliness and social skill deficits. The Community Helpers Project is specifically designed to provide opportunities for youth and young adults with developmental disabilities to explore community involvement and experience community service. Through the Community Helpers Project, participants will learn an array of social skills while providing services to the local community, such as cleaning up community parks, collecting non-perishable goods for food pantries, providing aid to local animal shelters, and completing craft projects with area seniors. By meeting new people, visiting agencies and helping others, participants will gain a sense of satisfaction and usefulness that will boost their confidence and encourage them to seek other social avenues, including employment. The JCCC Foundation grant will fund the entire program for one year.

The Peggy Notebaert Nature Museum provides a unique after school education and community outreach program to 50 Chicago Public School students in grades 7-12. The program, called TEENS: Teens Exploring and Explaining Nature and Science, is divided into three phases, each one building upon students' previous science knowledge and experience. In the first phase, 7^th and 8^th grade students participate in activities at the Museum to learn about biology, botany, physics, chemistry, and environmental science. In the second phase, 9^th and 10^th grade students apply their science knowledge to a year-long environmental restoration project and also assist with the Museum's public education programs. In the third phase, 11^th and 12^th grade students intern at the Museum during the school year developing scripts and curricular material describing the Museum's exhibits. Students in phases two and three also participate in job skills and college preparation workshops.

Through the efforts of CSCIP, students at Whitney Young Magnet High School in Chicago and LaBone Secondary School in Accra, Ghana have shared a sister school relationship since 1999 that allows students in both schools to learn about and interact with each other. The Accra-Chicago Web Video Exchange program will expand on this relationship by giving students in both schools the opportunity to participate in a 4-week after-school Web video course, first taught in Accra and then in Chicago. The course integrates anthropology, technology, performance arts, literature, and cultural studies to engage students in every day human issues in their own neighborhoods and encourage them to think creatively and critically about the role technology and media play in their lives. Students will learn how to write, shoot and edit short digital video narratives. After the completion of the course, the videos will be posted on a web site, where students will view the videos and participate in a web-based dialog initiated and guided by scholars and the project director. A portable, multimedia exhibition of the project will be featured at several public events and discussions in both Accra and Chicago; in Chicago, the exhibit will include a public performance by Whitney Young participants adapting a Ghanaian myth about knowledge to further interpret and promote the ideas investigated in their videos.

Through this project, Friends of the Chicago River (Friends) will train and support K-4 grade teachers throughout the greater Chicago area in its new innovative Exploring Rivers curriculum. For years, Friends�f environmental education program has helped 5-12 grade teachers integrate the Chicago River into their students�f studies through hands-on, interdisciplinary learning experiences that improve students�f understanding of a variety of academic subjects. Until now, however, Friends has not been able to offer K-4 teachers a river curriculum appropriate to their students�f development level. In June, Friends published its own K-4 curriculum called Exploring Rivers, which, through classroom content and hands-on projects, will introduce students to what rivers are, what plants and animals depend on rivers, and why rivers are important. JCCC Foundation funds will be used to train teachers in the use of the curriculum and to provide ongoing support and resources to teachers, including one-on-one consulting sessions, workshops, field trip assistance, and a lending library.

Based at the University of California, Berkeley, SEPUP provides curriculum programs that highlight science in the context of societal issues. Gregory Middle School will implement SEPUP modules in all 7th and 8th grade science classes, allowing students to not only conduct scientific investigations and process scientific evidence, but also use their results to make decisions and answer important societal questions. SEPUP programs are issue-oriented, but are careful not to �gtell�h students what decisions to make, instead providing materials and strategies that are designed to foster the skills and understanding students need to make their own decisions. As a result, students begin to appreciate both the power and limitations of science. The SEPUP curriculum modules include: Environmental Health Risks; Environmental Impact: Comparing Industries; Groundwater Contamination; Living With Plastics; and Investigating Wastewater: Solutions and Pollution.

For fourteen years, Irma C. Ruiz School has maintained a public garden/geodome on its grounds. Last year, a solar/wind generator was installed, which powers the garden�fs fountains, ponds and waterways. While having a garden on the grounds allows these urban students to study nature more easily, most of the school year takes place in the winter when conditions prevent them from being outside to gather the information from nature they require. The installation of a weather station on the school grounds will allow students to not only continue gathering data and conducting scientific observations even when inside, but also have access to a much larger variety of information. The weather station will harness the power generated by the solar/wind tower and provide a variety of weather data to classroom computers via wireless transmission. The real-time data can be manipulated in almost limitless ways to fulfill many different lessons in the math and science classes, such as analyzing complex data, generating graphs, making forecasts, determining cause/effect relationships, relating observations to collected data, etc. The information will also be available for use by students for their own individual science projects.

Project TAYO-SEI is a school-wide initiative to strengthen cultural awareness, build a sense of community and belonging among the student body, and promote opportunities for friendship development for students attending an elementary school and a junior high school. Both Link Elementary School and Margaret Mead Junior High School (the school that all Link students attend after the sixth grade) are experiencing an ever-growing diversity in their population, and recognize that it is extremely important that all students grow in their understanding of each other. This project will allow Link and Mead to build stronger connected school communities and expand their multicultural curricula. Specifically, Project TAYO-SEI will integrate multicultural education into fine arts, literacy and technology instruction, provide instruction related to character development with opportunities for students to practice cross-cultural skills through cultural events, and build a stronger connection between Link and Mead Schools and their students, especially those involved in ESL classes.

For many years educators have stressed the importance of reading and understanding books in early education. Unfortunately, many children in this community do not have access to books or are not introduced to reading before they enter school, and instead receive most of their early learning through television or video games. Maywood Fine Arts Association addresses this need through its Books Alive program, which uses music and dance to bring to life stories and characters from children�fs literature. Performed by advanced drama and dance students several times a month at schools, recreation centers, libraries, and other venues throughout the Chicago metro area, Books Alive helps stimulate and instill in each child a love of books and reading at an early age. Tailored to various age groups from pre-school through third grade, the performances are fun, engaging, and appealing to all children, especially those having difficulty learning to read. JCCC Foundation funding will support 12 Books Alive programs, including stipends for student performers, production materials, and books which will be donated to the host organization�fs library and to children attending the program.

Economic Achievers is a three-week summer program that targets high achieving minority junior high students from four disadvantaged suburbs and provides them with hands-on learning experiences in career awareness, money management, investing and entrepreneurship. Students in many south suburban schools have a limited understanding of economics and money management, and are often unaware of the connection between actions and consequences. Without an adequate background in and knowledge of money matters, these students will continue to be at an economic disadvantage as they grow up. By providing a learning environment in which students engage in real-life consumer experiences, students learn how to make sound financial decisions, develop decision-making and goal-setting skills, and gain a better understanding of economic principals. Activities include classroom simulations on personal finance issues such as saving, spending, borrowing and money management; print and on-line research; statistical analysis; interaction with local entrepreneurs; and visits to various financial institutions in Chicago, such as the Chicago Mercantile Exchange. Students participate in the program for three summers during their 6^th, 7^th and 8^th grade years.

ARTS is an innovative educational program at 6 Chicago public schools - Hayt Elementary School, Swift Elementary School, Amundsen High School, Senn Academy, Nettlehorst Elementary School, and Sullivan High School - which uses artist-teacher collaborations to enhance student understanding of core curricular subjects. For a minimum of three weeks, teachers and artists work together to first teach key concepts of a chosen unit in the curriculum, and then how to restructure the subject material into a dramatic work which can be performed. (For example, the dramatization of a history lesson, the transformation of a short story into a play, or the interpretation of a math or science principle in play form.) In transforming the subject matter into a dramatic form, students constantly revisit course subject material while also learning how written pieces are constructed and how to organize their ideas for presentation. As a result, students successfully master the required subject matter while at the same time learning an art discipline and gaining critical thinking skills and self-esteem. ARTS also provides a two-month after school component for participating schools, which deepens and reinforces the work being done in the classrooms.

Primary Academic Center, a K-3 public school, started the JOIN Program last year as a means to increase the academic achievement and positive self-esteem of its struggling students. JOIN is a one-on-one mentoring program between students and staff members, who meet several times a week to do homework, complete special projects, and simply spend time together. JOIN mentors are also encouraged to take their student out to different activities on the weekends to get to know each other better. The program has shown that with increased adult interactions, students are more willing to participate in school activities.

Funding from the JCCC Foundation will allow the program to expand to include the families of the students. Research indicates that children whose parents share in their formal education tend to do better in school. JOIN staff will meet weekly not only with the student, but also with the student�fs family, allowing their needs and concerns to be addressed as well. In addition, all JOIN families will participate in monthly evening meetings where a community speaker will address topics of interest to parents. With JCCC Foundation funding, the community, school, parents and children will all join together to increase the academic achievement of struggling students.

Schools are currently facing serious funding cutbacks, especially in the arts. The Skokie Northshore Sculpture Park will implement an educational outreach program enabling enable area schools to utilize its unique collection of contemporary sculptures in an enriching educational experience in art appreciation and creative writing. The program will use docents to provide assistance for teachers, give tours of the Park, and lead lectures, discussions and hands-on creative activities in the classroom.

For the past 10 years, Waters School has used a unique interdisciplinary ecology curriculum for grades K-8 that gives students extensive field experience in three distinct ecological systems - a natural wet/prairie/woodland forest preserve (Mighty Acorns program), man-made gardens (Waters School Gardens program), and a river (Riverbank Neighbors program). In Mighty Acorns, 3^rd-5^th grade students visit a local forest preserve three times a year to explore, learn ecological concepts, and perform restoration work. Waters School Gardens, covering 3/4 of an acre of land and expanding every year, is comprised of a variety of different gardens that students create, maintain, and use as living laboratories for many classroom curricular projects. In Riverbank Neighbors, students use the nearby Chicago River for a variety of projects including curricular projects, river maintenance, and river restoration. The school views ecology as the engine that drives its progressive educational vision: one that emphasizes integration of the disciplines, multiculturalism, and real, hands-on learning experiences. The JCCC Foundation grant will allow Waters to deepen this school-wide curriculum by employing a director of ecology programs.