Camelot Profile:Executive Director, Daniel Peticca
Daniel Peticca, who holds a master’s degree in Human Service from Lincoln University, is Chester, PA, born and bred. That’s why he was so excited when the opportunity arose last year to return to his hometown to lead Camelot’s Excel Academy program at Chester High School. Through his nine years as a teacher and counselor at Glenn Mills Schools about 30 miles from Philadelphia and now at Camelot, Peticca is doing what he loves, helping troubled kids find their way.
How would you assess the first year in Chester?
We had a great first year. Our program graduated 12% of Chester’s graduating class. The kids were very engaged and those who were not seniors are looking forward to coming back on September 3rd. We had to overcome some challenges with the facility. Chester High is an older building that had not been well-maintained and with the severe winter weather the pipes were freezing up and leaking from December to February in our section of the building. That meant we had to be flexible, including holding classes in the library. The moving around broke up our normative culture a little bit but we were able to work through it and have a positive year.
Chester-Upland is a deeply troubled school district. How is Camelot working with the district to improve achievement?
The best thing we can do is improve outcomes. That means improving attendance, test scores and graduation rates. The better the district does in those areas the more financial support they will get from the state. And that’s the path we set in our first year.
How are you helping these students do better?
Our staff is driven by the knowledge that a diploma in a kid’s hand might prevent them from having a gun in their hand in the future. We’re trying to get our kids to buy into education so down the road they are not on street corners or getting into trouble. We know where they’re at for eight hours a day; they’re at school. Our main thing is getting the kids to come to school. That’s how good things start happening.
Why is Camelot able to reach these kids when main stream school could not?
I think a big factor is the rapport-building with the staff members, knowing what’s going on in the community, being able to relate what’s going on in the community and always teaching and using a behavioral approach outside the box. Each individual is different. They have different situations going on and we have to understand the kid. It’s getting to know each child.
That sounds very time-consuming. How do you and your team devote so much attention to each student?
A priority I set when Camelot hired me as executive director was picking my own team. I wanted a hometown team. Two of my guys are Chester High grads who are members of the school’s basketball hall of fame. Almost half of my staff is from Chester, myself included. We know what’s going on in the community, what part of town is fighting with the other and who’s doing what to whom. We know the moms, dads, aunts and uncles so the job is really personal to us.
Can you give an example of one student this past year who came into the program in trouble and ended the year in a very positive way?
That could apply to so many of our students, but one student who turned himself around was liked so much by the Chester High principal that the student was given a job at the school working for the principal. He graduated in January and worked four hours a day for the principal through June. This kid came a long way. His mom was very proud. He wasn’t doing anything the year before and now he has a diploma on his way to starting at Cheney University.
There’s a lot of violence in Chester. How can these kids really have a chance to escape all that and compete?
With our rapport-building, we’re trying to get the kids to see different things, see that there is a better way, you can go to college, and you can travel. We work closely with community outreach programs such as the Safe Street corridor in which volunteers with orange shirts provide a corridor for the kids to get home. So we’re providing them with a safe corridor to get to and from school and then when they get to school we’re showing them that there’s a different way. We’re having guest speakers from Chester that are now physical therapists, lawyers, judges so that they just don’t see the normal every-day violence on their street corner. They can actually see someone from Chester that has been successful. And I think with Chester High graduates on staff from the same areas as some of these students they can see that we are now successful and giving back to them.
It sounds like you’re optimistic for what is possible in your hometown.
Again, it all starts with the school-age population. I was very proud to be part of the Chester School District this year. They brought their reading levels on the elementary level up 370%. That’s huge for the first year of this administration. It’s a good team to be a part of. I think decreasing violence starts with education.
