The Middle Bucks Institute of Technology’s Philanthropy Today Club students visited Bucks County Commissioners’ office.

Posted onAuthorJeanise Dimitri

The Middle Bucks Institute of Technology’s (MBIT) Philanthropy Today Club vis­it­ed the Bucks County Commissioners’ office on Wednesday, February 1st. February is Career and Technical Education Month® (CTE Month®), and the stu­dents pre­sent­ed their phil­an­thropic work with the District Attorney’s Office and Courthouse as well as mul­ti­ple Bucks County non-profits.

The 2022–2023 Group was giv­en the Heenan Challenge Grant to redesign, redec­o­rate and refur­nish a space for vic­tims to wait in dur­ing pro­ceed­ings in the cour­t­house.  District Attorney Mr. Matt Weintraub and ADA Ms. Jennifer Schorn shared two rooms with the stu­dents adja­cent to the court­rooms on the fourth floor. Mr. Stephen G. Heckman and Ms. Erica Burrows showed the club the rooms and allowed the stu­dents to work and brain­storm in the space.

With Raab funds the MBIT Philanthropy Today Club hopes to help mem­bers of our com­mu­ni­ty fac­ing strug­gles with men­tal health, sex­u­al abuse, and addic­tion to pre­vent fur­ther dam­age and obsta­cles. They plan to visit:

  • Gaudenzia
  • The Council of Southeast Pennsylvania Inc.
  • Village Improvement Association
  • Good Friends Inc
  • National Alliance on Mental Illness
  • Lenape Valley Foundation
  • Family Services Association
  • A Women’s Place
  • NOVA

In 2021–2022 the mis­sion of the Philanthropy Today group was to make the com­mu­ni­ty a safe, friend­ly, and healthy place. With the Heenan Grant, they researched, redesigned, redec­o­rat­ed, and refur­nished the victim’s wait­ing room in the Bucks County District Attorney’s office and lov­ing­ly ded­i­cat­ed this space to the vic­tims of Bucks County.

With the com­bined expe­ri­ences in the MBIT tech­ni­cal pro­grams, they used the fol­low­ing skills to com­plete the 2022 chal­lenge and are using many of the same skills to tack­le this year’s Heenan Challenge:

  • The Commercial Art and Multimedia stu­dents researched col­or the­o­ry and the effects of col­or on mood.
  • They held a school-wide pho­tog­ra­phy con­test to cre­ate the pho­tos dis­plays of the four sea­sons with nature scenes in sooth­ing colors.
  • Members from our Computerized Drafting and Engineering class cre­at­ed a blue­print and fur­ni­ture lay­out plan.
  • Early Childhood Education stu­dents select­ed age-appropriate toys and books for child devel­op­ment and iden­ti­fied a bet­ter loca­tion for the children’s area away from the doorway.

The pur­pose of the Philanthropy Today Club at MBIT is to teach stu­dents about char­i­ty through giv­ing respon­si­bly through grant allo­ca­tions and iden­ti­fy­ing needs with­in our com­mu­ni­ty.  Each year, the stu­dents receive a spe­cif­ic chal­lenge through the Heenan Challenge Grant. They are tasked with research­ing the prob­lem iden­ti­fied by the Challenge Grant and work to solve it using their tech­ni­cal and aca­d­e­m­ic skills.

Through the Raab Grant, the stu­dents con­duct a needs assess­ment of with­in their com­mu­ni­ty of Bucks County. They devel­op a mis­sion state­ment, con­duct research and site vis­its to deter­mine which local non-profits align with their mis­sion before pro­vid­ing the grants to the select­ed non-profit orga­ni­za­tions that make a dif­fer­ence in the com­mu­ni­ty annually.