Promise art

This cool work of art is by Amanda Lyons, a “graphic facilitator” who has been working with the United Way of the Greater Lehigh Valley on their nine-block Promise Neighborhood in Allentown, Pennsylvania. Lyons’s artwork, above, is a graphic representation of the “conveyer belt” that the Allentown Promise Neighborhood hopes to deliver to young people there. Details here.

Geoffrey Canada’s travels

Geoffrey Canada has been on the road more than usual this month, giving public talks to a variety of school and community groups. He spoke at the University of Dayton in Ohio where, according to a recent article in the Dayton Daily News, a local initiative called Taking Off to Success is modeled after the Harlem Children’s Zone’s Baby College. He also spoke at a Martin Luther King Day celebration at Wesleyan University and to a group in Columbia, South Carolina, that is trying to establish what they’re calling a Promise Zone, modeled after the Harlem Children’s Zone, in the city’s Eau Claire neighborhood. (According to an article in the State, Geoffrey Canada’s older brother, Dan, a Columbia resident, is on the board of the Eau Claire zone.)

Next month, Canada will speak in Haverford, Pennsylvania. In March, it’s Saginaw, Michigan. In April, York, Pennsylvania.