PPG Foundation Donates Nearly $400,000 to Education Programs and School

The PPG Foundation recently donated more than $385,000 to support educational programs in the Pittsburgh area, where the company maintains its global headquarters and several facilities. The grants highlight PPG’s commitment to supporting its local communities and the foundation’s top priority of increasing educational opportunities for youth, particularly in the areas of math and technology.

The recent grants included:

Carnegie Science Center – $221,800 in total for educational outreach, support of the STEM center, SciTech Days programming and field trips for underrepresented minority students;
Carnegie Mellon University – $88,000 in total for a chemical engineering graduate student fellowship, an American Chemical Society Colloid and Surface Science Symposium, and the Chemical Engineering Graduate Student Association;
Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh – $32,000 in support of color programming;
The Pennsylvania Governor’s School for the Sciences (PGSS) – $15,000 to support science-focused summer opportunity at Carnegie Mellon University for Pennsylvania high school students;
Reading Is FUNdamental Pittsburgh – $10,000 for the Books for Keeps Math Program;
Extra Mile Education Foundation – $8,000 in educational support;
Pirates Charities – $5,000 for Pittsburgh Pirates Education Days;
National Museum of Education in Partnership for America’s Future – $3,850 to give 42 schools districts in Allegheny County access to the latest SCIENCE SCREEN REPORT® (SSR) educational video series; and
American Chemical Society – $1,500 to support National Chemistry Week.

“PPG and its foundation remain committed to giving back to the communities in which we operate,” said Sue Sloan, executive director of the PPG Foundation. “We are happy to support so many great educational organizations and programs in our company’s hometown. These initiatives encourage students to explore the world around them – particularly in the areas of technology, engineering and math – and provide engaging learning experiences that will influence the future success of the participants and of advanced manufacturing.”

The Foundation also donated a combined $10,600 to the Oak Creek Franklin Joint School District in Oak Creek, Wisconsin, to support a robotics competition team and the purchase of 3D printing equipment. The two grants were made on behalf of PPG’s local industrial coatings facility.

A PPG Foundation grant for $8,500 is supporting a new FIRST® Robotics Competition team at the high school. The students are building and programing an industrial-sized robot and will compete against other high school students from around the region March 24 to 26 in Milwaukee.

The second grant for $2,100 helped fund the purchase of a 3D printer and scanner for sixth- through eighth-grade students. The equipment enables students to use the designs they create as part of the district’s Project Lead the Way pre-engineering curriculum to make actual parts.