The Butler County Community College Education Foundation received the largest Pennsylvania Educational Improvement Tax Credit contribution since its first in 2012, from MSA Safety, a Cranberry Township-based international developer and manufacturer of safety products.

MSA Safety’s $50,000 gift will support a BC3 program that enables sophomore through senior students to earn affordable, transferable credits in college courses taught at their high school or learning centers. It also benefits a game played by pupils as young as fourth-graders that increases financial literacy.

MSA Safety focuses its support primarily on organizations located in regions where the company operates and where its employees live, according to Glennis Williams, vice president and chief human resource officer at MSA Safety.

“(It’s) a very generous gift,” Mikayla Moretti, executive director of the BC3 Education Foundation and external relations, said. “One like this allows the foundation and the college to create opportunities and have something for everyone. It will have a very big impact and can support a lot of students.”

BC3’s College Within the High School program expanded this fall to include Slippery Rock Area High in Butler County and to West Middlesex Area Junior-Senior High in Mercer County. Reduced-tuition, college-level courses are also being offered this fall at participating high schools in Armstrong, Clarion, Clearfield, Jefferson and Lawrence counties.

Tuition and fees cost $225 for a three-credit BC3 course taught Monday through Friday at a Butler County high school or learning center during its regular hours, and $250 for a high school or learning center outside of Butler County during its regular hours.

BC3’s David C. Huseman Center for Economic Education administers a 30-week Stock Market Game that begins in September, as well as 10-week competitions in the fall and spring.

Fourth-graders through high school seniors competing in the game receive a hypothetical $100,000, make buy-and-trade decisions and track how those decisions would have played out in the market had they been real.

BC3’s Stock Market Game drew 1,547 students on 482 teams from 33 schools in Armstrong, Butler, Clarion, Clearfield, Elk, Jefferson, Lawrence and Mercer counties in 2024-2025.

The college recognized teams that were place-winners at an awards ceremony May 6 in Founders Hall on BC3’s main campus in Butler Township.

A team from Butler Intermediate placed first in the Western Region and second in Pennsylvania among middle schools in the fall 2024 competition. Phoenix Fancher, Cheza Harbaugh, Brielle Myers, Maxwell Oddo and Hunter Ryan ended the game with an equity of $141,110.29.

Luke Daubenspeck, Schaney Kamerer, Adelynn Miller, Kendall Rose and River Wolfgram were members of a Butler Intermediate team that finished second in the region and third in the state in the fall middle school competition with an equity of $140,521.23.

“They start to learn about personal finance and investing early, which is important so that your money has time to grow,” said Jamie Veltri, a family and consumer sciences teacher at Butler Intermediate and adviser to both teams.

A team from Seneca Valley placed second in the region in the fall high school competition. Bryce Fredericks, Abby Hock, Landon Newton and Alyssa Westrom finished with an equity of $144,173.55.

Pennsylvania’s EITC program provides tax credits to eligible businesses that contribute financially to a scholarship organization, to an educational improvement organization or to a pre-kindergarten scholarship organization.

Bill Foley is coordinator of news and media content at Butler County Community College.