Students sought for mural project
?Art, history and community service are being combined in a program for area teens being undertaken by the Douglas Education Center (DEC).
The Monessen post-secondary school is hosting a youth program starting July 5 that will result in a new mural at the Brownsville Wharf Riverside Park.
Brownsville Borough Council President Jack Lawver said the project will be formally presented to council at the July 12 meeting, but he doesn’t anticipate any objections.
“It’s good for the students and I feel it’s a good project and I feel council will be behind it with no problem,” Lawver said.
The mural will feature the steamboat “Enterprise” which was built in Brownsville in 1814 and was the first steamboat to ascend the Mississippi and Ohio rivers.
“We do have the transportation museum and it will help support that. It’s an added feature to enhance what we have in our town,” Lawver said.
The program can accommodate up to 50 students and applications are still being accepted for the program which starts July 5.
“We’ll keep taking applications until the program is full and even after, because sometimes a student will have to leave for some reason,” said Victoria Cochran, the admissions director for the program at the DEC.
The program will be held three days a week, Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays from 10?a.m. until 3?p.m., in July and August, then one evening a month from September through June. Students must be between the ages of 14 and 18 and reside in Fayette or Westmoreland counties. The participants will be paid a stipend for each class attended and will also receive a free meal. Transportation to the DEC in Monessen is provided. The program is underwritten by the Westmoreland-Fayette Workforce Investment Board.
Cochran said students must meet income eligibility guidelines.
“It’s for at-risk youth and the income guidelines this year are 230% above poverty,” Cochran said.
Cochran said the guidelines would allow a family of four to have an income of about $50,000.
“They eased up a bit this year, so we can reach more students,” Cochran said.
The classes will be taught by Bobbi Fine, a digital illustration teacher at DEC and by Jim Winegar, who worked with inmates at SCI-Fayette to create the Cast Iron Bridge mural in the Market Street parking lot in Brownsville.
“We’ll be working with the students to determine the design. The subject matter has already been selected; it will be the Enterprise,” Winegar said.
Winegar said since the boat was built prior to photography, the students will be working from an etching of the boat and will determine what background elements and style they want to put into the mural. Winegar said the students will learn planning and other skills and will be stretched beyond their current abilities by coordinating a large and complicated project.
Winegar said the goal is to have the new mural installed at the wharf by the end of the summer. Winegar said the students may take on additional mural projects throughout the year.
For more information or to register, call the DEC at 724-684-3684.