By: Alyson Kelly
Community service, academic achievement, academic improvement, attendance. Four important criteria in the game of life that nevertheless get downplayed, especially in the day to day lives of today's adolescents. Luckily for current and future generations, a program dedicated to the promotion of these values has been created to improve the future of individual students as well the nation in which they live.
The Challenge Program, Inc. was founded by Johnstown native and CEO of MTS Technologies, Inc. Dan Perkins in 2003 as a way to give back to his community. The Program focuses on awarding cash amounts to students who excel in community service, academic achievement, academic improvement, or attendance; because of this incentive, high school pupils across seven counties of southwestern Pennsylvania are now even more motivated to perform well in school. Success in school by today's generation, maintains Perkins, promotes a better future for the entire country.
The Challenge Program, a nonprofit organization, was recently awarded with $51,000 by the Wal-Mart Foundation to Assist with Programs that Encourage Student Achievement to aid in providing these cash incentives to sixteen area high schools. The check was presented in a ceremony to Mr. Perkins on December 16, 2009, at Conemaugh Valley Senior High School before students, past award winners, school representatives that included students from Johnstown High School, and local officials. Conemaugh Valley High School, which graciously hosted the press release of these new funds, gave a superb band performance that preluded the formal presentation of the grant and provided those in attendance with refreshments afterwards. Noted speakers included one of the Founding Executive Directors of The Challenge Program Barbara Grandinetti, the marketing director of the area Wal-Mart's, representative of the Education Department of Pennsylvania Mitch Agurs, and the founder of the organization Dan Perkins. In addition, two Conemaugh Valley High School students who have been awarded with cash incentives by The Challenge Program in the past briefly spoke of how the money helped them to pursue service and academic goals around the world.
In addition to these Conemaugh Valley students, two students from Johnstown High School who had been awarded with cash from The Challenge Program in the previous years were present that day as well. Richard Agurs and Katie Kovalchik won money from the program for academic improvement and community service, respectively. Kovalchik, now a senior planning to attend Penn State, was given the money during her sophomore year in high school and stored it in a savings account. Says Katie, "I greatly appreciated the money that The Challenge Program gave me as an award for my hours of community service. I'm glad that Mr. Perkins is closer to his goal of making the program national by this new partnership with Wal-Mart because I feel that it really does encourage students."
Dan Perkins has plans to make The Challenge Program a national organization in the future, and the new partnership with one of the largest retailers in the world is, he feels, a huge step towards making that dream a reality. After accepting the over-sized check made out to The Challenge Program for the amount of $51,000, Mr. Perkins made an acceptance speech that described his dedication to the development of today's youth. Speaking directly to the high school students in attendance that day, Perkins said, "I will be watching you."
