The Pennsylvania State System of Higher Education’s Board of Governors today voted unanimously to rename PASSHE’s acclaimed Partnership Program in honor of former Board member R. Benjamin Wiley.

Mr. Wiley, who had served on the Board since 1995, including eight years as vice chair and seven years as chair of the Human Resources Committee, died in June. He also served for more than 21 years as a member of Edinboro University of Pennsylvania’s Council of Trustees.

“Ben Wiley cared about and was proud of his association with the State System of Higher Education,” said Edinboro University President Dr. Frank G. Pogue. “He cared about everyone, especially young people and encouraged them to succeed. For the Board of Governors to recognize him in this way is a tremendous, and well-deserved, honor.”

The Board adopted a resolution changing the name of the Partnership Program – which each year provides hundreds of high school age students the opportunity to prepare for and succeed in college – to the “R. Benjamin Wiley Partnership Program.”

The resolution, which was presented to Mr. Wiley’s widow, Barbara, by Chancellor Dr. Judy G. Hample, noted that Mr. Wiley “had a passion for public service, dedicating his life to helping others improve theirs.”

“R. Benjamin Wiley’s commitment to helping all of those with whom he came into contact build a brighter future for themselves mirrors the mission of the Pennsylvania State System of Higher Education’s Partnership Program,” Dr. Hample said.

“This is indeed a great honor to Ben’s memory. This is an awesome program,” Mrs. Wiley said. “Ben supported young people in all of their endeavors, always encouraging them to seek some form of higher education and to always do their best.”

Mr. Wiley spent his lifetime providing service to others. At the age of 24, he was named executive director of the Greater Erie Community Action Committee (GECAC), a social services agency that at the time had a $1 million budget and was facing financial hardship, perhaps even closure. In the more than 30 years under Mr. Wiley’s leadership, GECAC grew into the major social services provider in the region, with an annual budget of $39.5 million, providing services to more than 50,000 clients, employing nearly 500 people and operating from 29 sites.

The Partnership Program was established by PASSHE 18 years ago to help encourage more students from Philadelphia’s comprehensive high schools to go to college. In the nearly two decades since its founding, the program has been expanded several times to include students from economically distressed families in Pittsburgh, Harrisburg, Erie, Meadville and Reading. Virtually all of the PASSHE universities play some role in the program.

The program is jointly funded by PASSHE, the individual universities and the Commonwealth through a special appropriation that has been approved each year by the Governor and the Legislature. Several private corporations also have contributed to the program, which has received national acclaim and has become a model for others to follow.

More than 350 high school sophomores are selected to begin participating in the program each year. The students spend two weeks during the summer after their 10^th grade year at a university campus close to their homes. After their junior year, they spend three weeks on a campus farther away and enroll in five mini-courses that are taught by university professors. By the time they are high school seniors, the students already have been introduced to college life, and most are motivated and ready to enroll.

To date more than 1,000 students who have completed the Partnership Program have graduated from high school and gone on to a four-year college or university, with about two-thirds enrolling at a PASSHE university. Many more have gone on to community college or trade school after earning their high school diploma. Students who complete the program are far more likely than their classmates to graduate from high school and pursue additional education.

“The partnership program made me what I am today. It instilled me with the confidence that I could make it,” said Alicia Rodriguez, a senior nursing major at Edinboro University who participated in the Partnership Program while in high school. “Every student should benefit from this kind of experience.”

Rodriguez said it was impossible to grow up in Erie and not be influenced by Mr. Wiley. “I felt Mr. Wiley all around me growing up,” she said. “I got my first summer job at GECAC when I was 15. That’s where I learned the importance of working hard and always doing my best.”

With nearly 106,000 students, the Pennsylvania State System of Higher Education is the largest provider of higher education in the Commonwealth. The 14 PASSHE universities offer more than 250 degree and certificate programs in more than 120 areas of study. Nearly 400,000 PASSHE alumni live and work in Pennsylvania.

The state-owned universities are Bloomsburg, California, Cheyney, Clarion, East Stroudsburg, Edinboro, Indiana, Kutztown, Lock Haven, Mansfield, Millersville, Shippensburg, Slippery Rock, and West Chester Universities of Pennsylvania. PASSHE also operates branch campuses in Clearfield, Kittanning, Oil City and Punxsutawney and several regional centers, including the Dixon University Center in Harrisburg.