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Employees and graduate-level students can now enroll their pre-school children in licensed programs in one of two BGCWPA Clubhouses  PITTSBURGH, Pennsylvania (August 13, 2021) — Boys & Girls Clubs of Western Pennsylvania (BGCWPA) and the University of Pittsburgh announced a partnership whereby preschool aged children of Pitt faculty, staff and graduate students may enroll in the Great Futures Preschool program at BGCWPA’s Carnegie or Estelle S. Campbell Lawrenceville Clubhouses.  The Great Futures Preschool program strives to be a PA Keystone Star 4 program at both Clubhouses, with a Certificate of Compliance from the Department of Human Services and a Keystone STARS [...]

On Wednesday, August 25, ESPN aired a package featuring University of Pittsburgh Quarterback Kenny Pickett’s generosity toward Boys & Girls Clubs of Western Pennsylvania in response to the new name, image and likeness allowances that provide an opportunity for college athletes to earn money from endorsement deals.   ESPN’s feature was in part to spotlight Kenny’s recent visit to the Estelle S. Campbell Clubhouse in Lawrenceville to meet BGCWPA youth and give them free t-shirts bearing his “Pickett’s Partners” logo. The initiative, sponsored by PGT Trucking and clothing company ITHEN USA,  will support BGCWPA programming through sale of the t-shirts.  Kenny [...]

Funding will support STEM programming plus mentoring, social-emotional training and service-learning programming for teens to promote positive decision-making PITTSBURGH, Pennsylvania (July 22, 2021) — Boys and Girls Clubs of Western PA received funding in the amount of $500,000 from the Richard King Mellon Foundation to support STEM programming and Wyman’s Teen Outreach Program® (TOP®) in each of its clubhouses, school district partners and community-based partners throughout the region. TOP® is a national youth development program designed to promote healthy behaviors, lifestyles and a sense of purpose in youth ages 12–19.  "We are thrilled to partner with Richard King Mellon Foundation on [...]

Attention all BGCWPA families, BGCWPA, hope that you have been enjoying your summer with us. We are sending out this communication to inform families that: BGCWPA will close all Clubhouses Monday July 19, 2021 for staff training and review.   Our Etna Specialty Camp location and Carnegie Clubhouse will remain open for families who are not able to make arrangements and need care. Our Girls basketball Academy will remain open. Please contact your Director who will assist you with transferring your paperwork to one of the two locations. This will be a first come first serve basis up to our capacity at [...]

Over the past 8 weeks, our partners at Accenture  had the privilege to work with the BGCWPA Career Works Program teens on a business marketing experiential learning project. The purpose of this programming was to learn about entrepreneurship and social media marketing, and to develop the skills for this type of work through a real-life project. From our partners at Accenture: "We partnered with Cope's Café and Pizzeria, a pizza and wings shop in Pittsburgh, and worked together with the participants to analyze their current social media presence, and create new ideas for the business in the future. The teens, both in [...]

BGCWPA recognized Juneteenth on Friday, June 18, as a holiday (Juneteenth is Saturday, June 19 this year). By observing Juneteenth as an official holiday, we provided staff with an opportunity to reflect and make a positive difference in the communities we serve. As part of a week long celebration, BGCWPA staff was honored to participate in the Juneteenth Freedom Days celebration in downtown Pittsburgh and the WPA Youth Fest in Mellon Park. Our Clubhouse members celebrated with events and activities that honor tradition and culture. Check out some of our 2021 Juneteenth photos and videos below! [...]

On behalf of the Board of Directors, leadership team, staff and most importantly, the 12,000+ youth we serve, BGCWPA would like to say THANK YOU to all who attended and supported the 44th Annual Nellie King Golf Classic held on Monday, June 7th at Sewickley Heights Golf Club.  A special thank you to our Title Sponsor, BAIERL Subaru More than $113,000 was raised in support of our mission to activate and advance the potential of our communities' youth, including an incredible "3 Minutes for Summer Camp Scholarships" in which 88 additional Summer Camp scholarships were supported! Some additional event highlights [...]

BGCWPA is proud to announce the WINNING app, Grade- up,  developed by our VERY OWN youth! Over the last few months, BGCWPA Clubhouse members have teamed up to compete in the all girls app building competition with our friends and partners at CGI BGCWPA had two all girl teams of programmers compete in this unforgettable opportunity. To compete, participants were asked to come up with an app idea and code it from scratch using Thunkable.  The first app BGCWPA members developed is known as Grade-up. Grade-up is an app to help students find motivation and peers for studying. Check out our [...]

Last week, BGCWPA celebrated the release of a youth designed video game during the 2021 Remake Learning Days.  "Super Slime Battle" was created from a partnership between the Boys & Girls Clubs of Western Pennsylvania STEM program and CMU Robotics Academy. For the last 20 weeks, BGCWPA members worked with representatives from CMU and the CoBox program as part of the Player-Programmed-Partner Games (P3G) project to imagine and execute all aspects of the video game including the characters, themes, and challenges. BGCWPA members utilized Cobots, robots that are designed to work closely with humans, to create the game in addition to working with [...]