Bethesda Children's Home Empowers Children to Transform a Community.

New Leadership Mentoring Program Offers Hope for a Better Tomorrow Through Creative Musical and Artistic Expression

MEADVILLE, Pa. -- Inner city neighborhoods across the country offer supportive programs to keep young children out of trouble, yet struggle to protect them during their teenage years when they are the most vulnerable to negative influences and criminal behavior. Youth after-school programs unfortunately experience a sharp decline in attendance around the age of fourteen when children tend to return to the streets. In an effort to reduce this devastating trend among teenagers in its own community, Bethesda's Children's Home is offering a new inspiring and magnetic leadership mentoring program (click here to view video) in Erie designed to empower community youth and keep them actively and positively engaged throughout their teenage years. With an emphasis on creative musical and artistic expression and the cultivation of peer-to-peer relationships and role-modeling, this innovative program provides local teens with a sense of confidence and worth that has great potential to ultimately lead them on the path to success, rather than back to the streets.

Bethesda's new program in Erie will be officially launched on July 10, 2008 at the former Johnson & Flick Tire Center on West 18th and will offer everything from drumming and dancing to a state of the art music recording studio and high-tech digital Yamaha Clavinova Pianos. According to Barry Bittman, MD, CEO and President of the Yamaha Music & Wellness Institute, "this extraordinary first of its kind program offers innovative, attractive and sustainable music as well as creative arts-based activities designed to attract youth to the center and enable personal accomplishment on many levels. Rather than relying solely on adult role models, adolescents will progressively be trained to become recreational music-making facilitators in a manner designed to foster the kind of peer-to-peer mentoring that can truly make a positive difference during these vulnerable years. I'm personally convinced that this unique strategy has great potential to transform not only the children and youth, but also the neighborhood."

"The goal of these expressive activities is not to simply inspire an interest in the arts or improve musical or artistic skills. For Bethesda Children's Home, the bar is set higher: our clear-cut expectations are for life-long success (college or trade school) and positive community contribution," noted Gene Wisinski, CEO of Bethesda Children's Home. "Also, rather than relying solely upon adult facilitators, this innovative approach based upon Dr. Bittman's research will for the first time engage responsible youth facilitators. These adolescents are carefully recruited and progressively nurtured within a system that rewards one's ability to maintain, demonstrate and model high standards and positive behavior."

Based upon Bittman's underlying evidence-based recreational music making strategy that emphasizes creative expression as a catalyst for meaningful verbal disclosure, the program's ultimate goal is to promote heightened understanding while fostering a needed sense of personal worth, values, responsibility and tolerance. This effective strategy is consistent with the philosophy stated by the late Fred Rogers, "whatever is mentionable is manageable."

In an era of chronically high juvenile crime rates, the development of this program could not be more crucial. Children and teens are most vulnerable to either committing or becoming a victim of crime after the school day ends, between the hours of 2:30 p.m. and 8:30 p.m. Bethesda's new leadership mentoring program has been designed as a reproducible template for developing programs in other neighborhoods that can empower young teens as mentors and reduce the likelihood of them returning to the streets.

"When kids have nothing to do, they get in trouble. I know I can be a positive role model. I can listen to them. It makes me feel good inside when I can help other kids leave the bad behind," said 16-year-old Lakita Leggett, who looks forward to serving as a teen facilitator for the new program. Donovan Quinn, a 16 year old facilitator in training reflects upon his own experience in the neighborhood. "Many kids don't have a positive role model these days. I didO it was my sister who worked hard and always did her work. I'm a good exampleO a good student, I stay out of trouble and I can also be fun to be around. I want to spend time helping kids at Trinity learn to concentrate on themselves and do good instead of thinking about their problems."

Bethesda Children's Home has already initiated the process of renovating the second floor of their new center located on 349 West 18th Street to serve this project. The program is expected to stand as a symbol of hope, support and commitment to the local community, keeping children off the streets and on a path to success. Supporters include world-renowned music products industry leaders such as Yamaha's Music & Wellness Institute, Remo, Inc. many of Erie's community agencies such as United Way, the Erie Community Foundation, Senator Jane Earll and many other national foundations dedicated to music and the arts.

Bethesda Children's Home has been providing programs and services to families in the "Little Italy" neighborhood since the early 1990's through its current facility, Bethesda Community Place (Trinity Center) located at 462 West 18th Street. The new center, just a block from Bethesda Community Place, will expand Bethesda's mission in Erie and enhance the current transformation and revitalization efforts taking place in the neighborhood.