FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
December 10, 2015
Contact: Tiffany Tibbot
Director of Operations
Phone: 765.977.9626
ttibbot@peacelearningcenter.org
Indianapolis-based Peace Learning Center receives $800,000 Lilly Endowment grant
Two-year grant will support strategic goals including restorative practices, expanding school programs for parents and teachers and increasing service opportunities for students
INDIANAPOLIS, IN– Lilly Endowment Inc. has awarded Peace Learning Center an $800,000 grant to support its efforts to educate students, teachers, and parents in conflict resolution and social emotional learning skills. PLC’s education programs are designed to improve academic outcomes while reducing school discipline problems. The grant will also support a major partnership with ACT OUT – an interactive theater troupe directed by Claude McNeal Productions – and create more program partnerships with underserved area schools.
Peace Learning Center’s approach incorporates communication skills, bullying prevention, diversity appreciation and conflict resolution techniques for students, teachers and as many family members as possible. The goal of Peace Learning Center and Act Out’s program partnership is to improve academic performance and build character through relationship and conflict management education.
“Lilly Endowment’s support will enable us to expand proven programs that help youth build conflict resolution and critical thinking skills and deepen their commitment to education,” said Tim Nation, co-founder and executive director of Peace Learning Center.
During the next two years, Peace Learning Center will create partnerships with schools that serve students who live in six neighborhoods that are high-priority areas due to high levels of crime and other factors.
These schools, referred to as One Indy Schools, receive Peace Learning Center programming for students in PreK through first grade. Students in fifth and sixth grade will be given the opportunity to serve as peer mediators for handling peer-to-peer conflict. Teachers and families from each One Indy School will participate in workshops tailored to improve positive connections between the school and community.
Peace Learning Center is an Indianapolis-based non-profit that has impacted the lives of more than 195,000 people locally and internationally since it first began in 1997. Its mission is to educate, inspire and empower people to live peacefully. Its programs are now in operation in eight cities nationally and five countries worldwide. Every year, nearly 10,000 youth and adults participate in Peace Learning Center programs.
As a community educational institution, Peace Learning Center promotes healthy learning, workplace and community environments by establishing safe and common ways to address differences and teaches processes to help build community and healthy communication for youth, parents, adults, and professionals. To learn more, visit www.peacelearningcenter.org.
Lilly Endowment Inc. is a private philanthropic foundation created in 1937 by three members of the Lilly Family – J.K. Lilly Sr. and sons J.K. Jr. and Eli – through gifts of stock in their pharmaceutical business, Eli Lilly & Company. It supports the causes of religion, education and community development. The Endowment affords special emphasis to projects that benefit young people and promote leadership education and financial self-sufficiency in the nonprofit, charitable sector.
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