St. Patrick's Day Celebrated At The Comcast/Nutmeg Big Brothers Big Sisters "Beyond School Walls" Mentoring Program

There was a wee bit of amateur step-dancing, the lilt of childish laughter, and a whole lot of wearing o' the green as twenty-five high-energy young people from New Britain gathered recently at Comcast's Western New England Regional Office in Berlin to salute the Emerald Isle and St. Patrick's Day.

The children - third, fourth and fifth grade students from New Britain's Lincoln Elementary School - are taking part in the "Beyond School Walls" youth mentoring program. "Beyond School Walls", now in its fifth successful year, is sponsored and hosted by Comcast and managed by Nutmeg Big Brothers Big Sisters, Connecticut's premier youth mentoring organization. Each week, the children travel by bus from the Lincoln Elementary School to the Comcast facility for an hour and a half session during which they meet and bond with twenty-five volunteer Big Brothers and Big Sisters from the media/technology company, who've quickly become their friends, sounding boards and role models.

Karen Perham-Lippman, Comcast's Manager of Community Investment, said, "At our 'Beyond School Walls' sessions we try to use the major holidays as learning experiences as well as fun experiences for the children. We've already celebrated Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas and Valentine's Day. At our St. Patrick's Day get-together, we discussed the contribution of the Irish to America and then asked the children, with the help of their mentors, to trace their own ethnic roots by filling out a family tree chart that we created."

"When I was working on the family tree," one mentee said, "I learned things about my family I didn't know before. I also ate some shepherd's pie at 'Beyond School Walls'. They told me shepherd's pie is Irish food and I liked it a lot. I think I'll have it again sometime."

"Our St. Patrick's Day celebration was just another reminder that 'Beyond School Walls' is a real win-win," said Ivana Kirk-Thigpen, the Nutmeg Site-Based Coordinator who supervises the program. "The children are inspired by their Comcast mentors. The mentors are equally inspired and energized by the children. And the children bring back to their community, their school and their families the learning, increased self-esteem and positive energy they've picked up as program participants."

Comcast Corporation (Nasdaq: CMCSA, CMCSK) is a global media and technology company with two primary businesses, Comcast Cable and NBCUniversal. Comcast Cable is the nation's largest video, high-speed Internet and phone provider to residential customers under the XFINITY brand and also provides these services to businesses. NBCUniversal operates 30 news and entertainment cable networks, the NBC and Telemundo broadcast networks, television production operations, television station groups, Universal Pictures and Universal Parks and Resorts. For more, go to: www.comcastcorporation.com.

Nutmeg Big Brothers Big Sisters is an affiliate of Big Brothers Big Sisters of America, the longest established youth mentoring organization in the world - founded in 1904. It helps its clients, children from low-income single-parent and no-parent homes avoid risky behavior and reach their highest potential. Nutmeg does this by creating one-on-one relationships between children in need and professionally-screened, caring adult volunteers. Based in Hartford, Nutmeg was founded in 1966. It's funded, in part, by United Way organizations. It serves thousands of youngsters in 111 of the state's 169 municipalities. For more information, go to: www.nutmegbigbrothersbigsisters.org.