How a USC Dornsife service program shapes multiple generations of local families and Trojans
Patricia Perez grew up just down the street from USC in the 1990s. She fondly remembers being tutored in math and English by Trojan undergraduates through USC Dornsife’s Joint Educational Project (JEP). Now a special education assistant for students with behavioral issues, she recalls accompanying her mother — who worked at USC’s School of Early Childhood Education and is also named Patricia Perez — to campus for JEP-hosted potlucks as a child. “I would run around the JEP House,” she says with a smile.
Decades later, Perez is watching history repeat itself. Her daughters, Nicole Plancarte, 14, and Sophia Plancarte, 11, have participated in JEP since preschool. They now benefit from several JEP initiatives at their school, the James A. Foshay Learning Center near USC. These included WonderKids, a hands-on STEM education program, and Little Yoginis, which teaches children the basics of yoga.
What began more than 50 years ago as a modest, community service program designed to serve USC’s surrounding neighborhoods, JEP has since evolved into one of the university’s most enduring initiatives — one whose impact spans generations. Today, some 2,000 USC students volunteer annually in nearly 120 K-12 classrooms.