News
October 7, 2008
Bank of NY Mellon Day of Caring.
August 27, 2008
New Community LEARNS program positions announced.
May 29, 2008
Wireless Neighborhoods Annual Meeting at Community House Church.
May 14, 2008
Wireless Neighborhoods staff and Community LEARNS trip to Washington D.C.
United Way of Allegheny County Funds Wireless Neighborhoods
Calendar
3/31/09
SES Application Process
10AM-12PM
Joyce Tompkins, Director of Youth Services (Hill House Association)
Joseph Dostilio, Community LEARNS Program Director (Bloomfield Garfield Corporation)
4/9/09
Basic Tutor Credential REVIEW and Test
3PM-6PM
Ellen Botkin, Consultant (Wireless Neighborhoods)
4/15/09
Recruiting/Retaining/Recognizing Volunteers
10AM-12PM
Lisa Thorpe-Vaughn, CEO (Non-Profit Leadership Training Institute)
4/21/09
SPARC Web Edit Training
10AM-12PM
Judy Palkovic, Administrative Director
Georgetta Rue, Data Specialist (3 Rivers Connect)
4/29/09
Intervention Using SBA data
10AM-12PM
Pittsburgh Public School Staff
Peabody Community Learns Students at the Bank of New York Mellon Career Day
History
Wireless Neighborhoods was formed as a non-profit corporation in December 2003. The organization has its roots deep within the lower income neighborhoods of the City of Pittsburgh. The establishment of Wireless Neighborhoods as an independent entity was the culmination of years of cooperation and the tireless efforts of several of Pittsburgh’s preeminent community organizations including Bloomfield-Garfield Corporation, Community House Church, and Hill House Association.
Created to improve community and faith organizations’ capacities to respond to issues that affect the lives of the children and families in the neighborhoods they serve, Wireless Neighborhoods has chosen quite purposely since its inception to target a majority of its efforts and resources on improving the quality of afterschool programming because of the alarmingly low levels of academic proficiency, particularly for the children in the City’s African-American and lower income neighborhoods. Wireless Neighborhoods and its partners have helped transform afterschool programming from safe places with homework help and a snack into truly innovative, professional and youth-friendly instructional environments that are setting the standards for community afterschool practices.
Staff
Wireless Neighborhoods maintains a small staff with an executive director, three full-time education specialists and a part-time technology coordinator.
Accomplishments
- Maintain a wireless broadband network across 40 Community and Faith Partners
- Raised over $3 Million in Government Funding since 2004 to support quality Afterschool programming
- First organization Selected by the United Way under its new competitive funding formula
- Established and supported 12 community-school partnerships serving over 500 children over the past 3 years
- Delivered over 50 hours of afterschool Staff Development in 2006-07
- First community organization to require partner organization staff to have the PA Department of Education approved Basic Tutor Credential
- Managing data collection effort across more than 20 community and faith organizations
- Developed 3 curricula that are being used across multiple afterschool program sites