CITY LIMITS: Wharton West Phila. Project goes national

If someone were to tell local community leaders a decade ago that the University's relationship with West Philadelphia was to serve as a model for schools in other urban areas, they would have laughed out loud. West Philadelphians once saw the University as a giant monster eating up land and destroying neighborhoods. Indeed, it is said that a local child once portrayed it as a fire-eating dragon in a drawing. But in 1987, officials of the Wharton School decided to do something to change that image, and set up the Wharton West Philadelphia Project. The project has received so much acclaim from Wharton students and community leaders, that it is now becoming a national organization, setting up similar programs in the San Francisco area and in New York City. According to Lisa Hoffstein, the Wharton West Philadelphia Project's first director, the program was started to break the negative stereotypes that the University and community held about each other. When the program went national last year, Hoffstein was tapped as its national director. The program has opened branches at the University of California at Berkeley and Columbia University. Jeanette Valentine, director of Berkeley's East Bay Outreach Program, said last week that the program has "smoothed out tensions" between their university and the three communities around campus. "There was the opinion that the university was using services and not paying their fair share," Valentine said. "The program has really helped." · Alia Walker-Mohammed, the current director of the Wharton West Philadelphia Project, said last week that both the University and West Philadelphia communities had erected imposing barriers separating each other. "For a long time . . . even though there wasn't a physical wall, there was a mental one," Walker-Mohammed said. "There was so much negative energy fed to students. They wouldn't venture out." The program organizers hoped to change that. "There is no question that there was a need for such things," former director Hoffstein said last week. "It's resulting in a perception that the community has more access to the University. The two worlds are not so far apart, they share a common community." The project was originally founded four years ago when the Milken Foundation, set up by Wharton alumnus Michael Milken, approached the school with an idea for an outreach program to deal effectively with inner-city problems. The foundation granted $300,000 per year to Wharton over a period of five years in order to start the program at the University. According to officials, the project's mission is to bridge the gap between the communities of the University and West Philadelphia through philanthropy and communication. The project consists of four programs: the Technical Assistance Program, the Young Entrepreneurs Program, Skills Training and Employment Preperation, and Building Relationships to Insure the Development of Greater Educational Success, better known as BRIDGES. BRIDGES connects Wharton undergraduates and Philadelphia junior high school students in a big brother-type recreation program to give the teenagers support. According to Douglass Mahoney, assistant principal at Sayre Middle School, said that he thinks the program provides a positive image for the students. "It provides our kids with role models," Mahoney said last week. "Especially positive role models. The kids think, 'This is something I can do after high school.' " The Young Entrepreneurs Program assigns MBA candidates to West Philadelphia high school students to help them develop business plans. The high school student then seeks funding to implement the idea. Students must present the plan to a panel and then be interviewed. The Skills Training and Employment Preperation, or STEP, program trains community residents in secretarial and typing skills and places them in jobs within the University. The three-week course teaches trainees typing, word processing and how to prepare resumes and job applications. The Technical Assistance Program is one of the project's best known. This program gives advice on subjects ranging from marketing schemes to balance sheets. Local business people come to the project seeking help with a facet of their operations. Interested MBA students tackle problems within their fields of expertise -- marketing or management, for example.

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