BGSU’s Partnerships for Community Action and the Center for Innovative and Transformative Education award the grants each year to projects that are based on reciprocity, mutual benefit and equal participation.

Of the 12 programs funded, the three from the college are:

• “Education to Reduce Risky Behaviors in Youth”–This program promotes informed decision making and reducing risky behavior among middle school students by defining and identifying risky behavior and its consequences. Partners include Peggy Adams, field coordinator and instructor in social work at the University's College of Health and Human Services, and Violetta Rhea of Fremont Middle School and Shelley Fannin of Fremont Ross High School.

• “Sexuality, Medication and HIV/AIDS and the Older Adult”–The program will develop an HIV/AIDS prevention/education group for people over 50–the fastest-growing age group of HIV-positive individuals. Collaborating on the project are Dr. Nancy Orel, director of the gerontology program, and Dr. Charles Stelle, an assistant professor of gerontology, as well as Dr. Wendy Watson, an instructor of family and consumer sciences, and Danielle Brogley, Wood County Senior Center.

• “Summer Program for Enhancing Language and Literacy” (SPELL)–This project is a partnership to promote language and literacy skills in at-risk first-grade children. Leading the project are Dr. Lauren Katz, an assistant professor, and Laura Schrock, a clinical supervisor in the BGSU Department of Communication Disorders, and Dick Dillon, principal at Lincoln Elementary School, Findlay.