PennCorp: A lesson in service

Students help to beautify city A group of students elected to come to the University a few days ahead of schedule, enticed by promises of early wake-up calls, hard work and a chance to spend more time off campus than on it. PennCorp, a four-day community service program which began last Wednesday, gave incoming freshman and a handful of upperclassmen an opportunity to volunteer in West Philadelphia during the day and hear from local community groups at night. On their first full day, students worked with Habitat for Humanity, rebuilding several dilapidated houses throughout impoverished sections of the city. "I can't believe there are so many abandoned houses in West Philadelphia," College freshman Sophie Stein said. "We need to do something about that." During the second day of the PennCorp program, participants split up into smaller groups and went to different sites to advise local high school students about college. They also visited with senior citizens at a nursing home and worked with teens and children at a homeless shelter. "I think the freshman have really had their eyes opened up to a lot of things they'd never seen before," PennCorp co-coordinator Karina Sliwinski said. This year's PennCorp program culminated in the volunteers' attempts to restore the Shaw Middle School, a project the University began last year in conjunction with the Anti-Graffiti Network. Inside the Shaw school on Saturday, students were hard at work repainting the cracked and peeling paint on the walls of two classrooms, the auditorium doors and seats and the rusted chain link fence that rings the blacktop recreation area. Shaw Principal Albert Bichner thanked the PennCorp volunteers as they ate hoagies inside the school's cafeteria. "It uplifts me," he told them. "It uplifts my staff and its going to uplift my students when they come into school." PennCorp's work at Shaw Middle School is "a chance for revitalization?a chance to show the kids people care about them," Bichner added. The participation in this year's PennCorp was the largest yet, due to an increased number of returning volunteers. Co-coordinator Madeleine Lopez, a College senior, said PennCorp organizers have modified the program each year to suit more participants.