Tuesday, March 19, 2024

Cellphone provider donates $30K to Brigade Boys and Girls Club

(Port City Daily/File).

WILMINGTON — A multi-thousand dollar donation to a local youth nonprofit will support STEM programming in the area.

UScellular announced a $30,000 donation to the Brigade Boys & Girls Club. It will support students, kindergarten through 12th grade, in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM), as well as within academic enrichment programs. 

A press release from the cellphone provider noted that the Boys & Girls Clubs of America’s National Youth Outcomes survey showed youth enrolled in the clubs versus its national peers sustained interest in pursuing STEM careers 52% over 27%. 

UScellular’s 2022 infusion of funds will provide more hours for STEM programming, as well as equipment and supplies to help with the club’s summer camps and afterschool programs.

“We’ve heard from parents and students that they think STEM is good for their future careers, but 48% of students and 41% of parents don’t know enough about the opportunities a STEM education would afford,” Jeremy Taylor, director of sales for UScellular in eastern North Carolina, said in a release.

According to COO Angie Hill of Brigade Boys and Girls Club, the program has hosted over 240 STEM sessions. The work has spanned from studying DNA to underwater drones to chemistry.

“We are opening doors for today’s youth,” Hill said.

In 2021, as part of its After School Access Project, UScellular donated 2,845 hotspots, equal to approximately $2.6 million in services. This allowed for free mobile connections to nonprofits that support youth after school. 

Over the last decade UScellular donated nearly $21.4 million to programs.

“Brigade Boys and Girls Club here in New Hanover County provides this critical access so that we can build a future of bright and enthusiastic tech leaders,” Taylor said in the release.


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Shea Carver
Shea Carver
Shea Carver is the editor in chief at Port City Daily. A UNCW alumna, Shea worked in the print media business in Wilmington for 22 years before joining the PCD team in October 2020. She specializes in arts coverage — music, film, literature, theatre — the dining scene, and can often be tapped on where to go, what to do and who to see in Wilmington. When she isn’t hanging with her pup, Shadow Wolf, tending the garden or spinning vinyl, she’s attending concerts and live theater.

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