Students go on to become employees—including ours. That's one reason we support education and vocational training in areas where we operate. Education and training are central to improving livelihoods and sustaining long-term economic development. We focus our investments on school- and work-based career and technical programs. We sponsor reading, science and math classes, and we help train educators.
Improving Education
Many of our efforts to improve education are focused in the areas of science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM). As such, Chevron has partnered with Project Lead The Way, one of the leading providers of STEM programs for middle and high school students in the United States. Our contributions will help the organization, which currently reaches 400,000 students, expand in areas in California where Chevron has significant operations. Our funds have started engineering programs at 15 high schools in the state and trained 30 teachers to teach 800 students.
Also in California, the Chevron Classroom Challenge awarded 10 teachers who exhibited innovation in the classroom. Through our partner DonorsChoose.org, more than 300 teachers submitted creative STEM education strategies to a panel of Chevron employees and business partners. Each of the 10 winners received $25,000 for their schools for future STEM programs.
Through DonorsChoose.org, Chevron funds have supported school districts in California, especially in underserved areas, to obtain STEM resources for their classrooms. To date, Chevron's contributions have funded more than 2,000 projects and impacted 195,000 students. In 2010, Chevron announced a partnership with California State University East Bay (CSUEB). This funding, part of our California Partnership Initiative, significantly expanded CSUEB's Mathematics Achievement Academies. Twelve new Chevron Mathematics Achievement Academies helped 225 underserved students in middle and high schools in Contra Costa and Alameda counties. Chevron's commitment will span three years, allowing students to pursue a three-year college preparatory sequence of Algebra I, Geometry and Algebra II.
In Vietnam, Chevron is working to increase educational opportunities for children in the Mekong Delta. Chevron and its partners—the National Fund for Vietnamese Children, Mitsui Oil Exploration Co. Ltd., and PTT Exploration and Production Public Co. Ltd.—donated a total of $125,000 for scholarships granted to 775 schoolchildren in four provinces. The consortium also will upgrade one school in each province and in Can Tho City.
Since 1993, the Chevron Open Minds program has taken Canadian schoolchildren out of the classroom and immersed them in rich learning environments in the community, such as the Calgary Zoo, the Glenbow Museum, the Cross Conservation Area and the Telus World of Science. More than 50,000 students and 2,000 teachers have participated in the award-winning program.
Chevron Bangladesh partners with Save the Children to bring its Shobar Jonno Shikkha (Education for All) initiative to 15 schools near the Bibiyana gas field. Using a community-based approach, the program provides cost-effective early child development and informal primary education to achieve improved educational results. We currently support a staff of teachers and teachers' aids who have been hired and trained to supervise 440 students who were previously unable to attend school due to geography or illness.
As part of our ongoing relationship with the Dunoon community near our refinery in Cape Town, South Africa, and our Energy for Learning program, Chevron South Africa funded the renovation and restocking of the Inkwenkwezi Secondary School library. The $56,000-plus project included a refurbishment of the existing library, the installation of IT systems, the addition of audiovisual equipment and a restocking of materials based on the school curriculum. Chevron also provides ongoing funds for the employment of a librarian and assistant.
Chevron's other key educational initiatives include the University Partnership Program and our work with the Discovery Channel Global Education Partnership to provide learning centers at underserved primary schools in Angola, Brazil, Nigeria, South Africa and Venezuela.
Providing Job Training
Chevron Philippines partners with local communities, governments and nonprofits to provide opportunities for at-risk youth, who include street kids, dropouts and children in trouble with the law. Since 2006, the KAPATID program, a partnership with the Marcellin Foundation and the Education and Employment Alliance, has provided technical training and job placement services to more than 337 out-of-school youth, at least 73 percent of whom are now employed.
Chevron's refinery near Cape Town, South Africa, trains disadvantaged students, helping address a shortage of local skills in the oil, gas and chemical manufacturing industries. Students participate at the refinery in a mentorship program with employees and managers. In 2009, we funded 11 student scholarships to South African universities.
Chevron has played a key role in helping to found, organize, develop, and fund the Saudi Petroleum Services Polytechnic in Dammam. It is the country's first institute to train students for field service jobs in the country's petroleum industry. Launched in 2008, the institute graduated its first class in 2010.
Chevron continues to support The Bread Project, a Berkeley, Calif.-based career training program for low-income people in the Bay Area. The program provides training in basic culinary skills, wholesale bakery production and customer service as well as job placement. Chevron's funding helped to support an expansion in 2010 into an 8,000-square-foot bakery in Emeryville, Calif. Chevron also supports The Bread Project with volunteerism, including pro bono business planning and hands-on help in the bakery.
Updated: January 2012