Appeal for the Summer Urban Program
Dear SUP Friends & Supporters,
Summertime is fast approaching, and PBHA’s Summer Urban Program (SUP), now in its 29th year, is once again gearing up for six weeks of education, enrichment, and employment! In 2009, our 12 neighborhood-based camps will provide 800 low-income children, 90 at-risk teens, and 120 college students with life changing summer experiences. Morning academics, afternoon field trips, job opportunities, and an extraordinary public service experience—SUP does it all!
Each year SUP logs an astounding 38,000 hours of classroom instruction. College-age senior counselors co-teach with junior counselors from Boston-area high schools on topics of interest to them. Together, they design a unique curriculum that ranges from mythology to current issues affecting the campers’ communities, in addition to SUP’s modern take on the three R’s—math, literacy, and science. Field trips frequently supplement morning lessons, creating a classroom without walls for our campers.
Over the years, SUP has received remarkable feedback from the communities it serves. Last year, of 1,000 parents, campers, and counselors surveyed:
• 98% of parents would recommend the camp to other parents
• 93% of campers said that they learned new things over the summer
• 88% of junior counselors hoped to be involved with their community during the year and wrote that
skills gained over the summer would help them in the future
• 94% of senior counselors reported having engaged in meaningful community service
This year will be especially challenging, but SUP is dedicated to continuing to offer high-quality summer programming. With the expected reductions in funding sources this summer, your individual support is more important than ever. In some of our communities, loss of public funding has made SUP the only viable summer alternative. Moreover, the financial crisis has disproportionately affected the families we serve and your donation is necessary to maintaining the low cost of camp. Please join us this summer in keeping SUP an accessible resource for families in Boston and Cambridge by making a donation today!
Thank you,
Vicky Guo ’11 Iris Tian ’11
PBHA Resource Development Co-Chairs
To donate via our secure website, visit www.pbha.org/donate.