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WHEREAS, Global Minds is a weekly after-school program at Taylor Allderdice High School that aims to help new students and their native English-speaking peers to better understand each other through discussion and activities centering on human rights, diversity, sustainable development and international relations while combatting the issues of cultural intolerance, ignorance and discrimination; and,
WHEREAS, the project was started by Allderdice freshman, Peyton Klein, when she observed that a new classmate and the teacher were having trouble communicating; the difficult interaction between the two spurred Peyton to better understand the issues that non-English speaking students were experiencing; and,
WHEREAS, amid the fallout of President Trump's executive order putting a temporary hold on refugees and visa holders from seven Muslim-majority nations, Peyton decided to focus on cultural tolerance and giving the refugee population at Allderdice the tools to feel welcome and successful. Each week, English speaking students provide one hour of homework help and conversational English practice, paired with an activity centered on diversity, human rights and equality in order to tackle issues of islamophobia and cultural intolerance. Under the guidance of Allderdice English as a Second Language teacher, Jane Valinsky, Peyton has written for and received grants in the amounts of $1000 from Awesome Pittsburgh, $2500 from the Vert Charitable Trust and an initial grant of $4500 from the Sprout Fund's "100 Days of US", an incentive that supports community-led projects during the first 100 days of the new presidential administration. Peyton plans to use the grant money for field trips, tutoring materials, curriculum assistance, smart boards for immigrant and refugee students and to invite speakers to talk to Global Minds students; and,
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NOW, THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that the Council of the City of Pittsburgh does hereby recognize and commend Peyton K...
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