Cinergy Awards $39,500 To Nine Local Schools For Education Initiative

CINCINNATI, June 24, 2005 — Boone County, Princeton City, Monroe Local, Lebanon City and Talawanda District Schools are among 16 school systems selected to receive Cinergy technical assistance grants toward their commitment to invent better schools.

The grants are the second phase of funding for the Cinergy Foundation’s educational reform initiative, BASICS, Building Assets & Support for Innovative Communities & Schools. Since 1999, Cinergy has invested approximately $2.5 million in Ohio, Kentucky and Indiana schools as part of an ongoing commitment to improve education in the communities it serves. Each of these schools will be receiving $1,000 in 2005 and $1,000 in 2006 for technical assistance such as helping teachers to create assessment tools that measure significant learning. Each school will also be partnered with an experienced school that participated in the first round.

“Five years ago the Cinergy Foundation rolled out a new grant initiative to support substantive school reform, and we have seen promising results in the schools that participated,” said J. Joseph Hale, Cinergy Foundation president. “We learned, though, that real change would have to be built over time and that technical assistance would be necessary to overcome barriers to change. That’s why we are continuing our BASICS program.”

BASICS Level Two provides the technical assistance to support a comprehensive approach to the invention of better schools for up to 30 school districts and their communities in the Cinergy territory. The school districts supported in the first round of BASICS provide the technical assistance. These are districts that have proven that their work with their communities the past five years has resulted in significant increases in student achievement.

Four local districts from the first round of participating schools will be assisting the new recipients:

• Fairfield Grant ($12,500)- assisting Seymour, IN; Talawanda, OH; Lebanon, OH; Plainfield, IN
• Deer Park Grant ($9,000)- assisting Monroe Local, OH; Lebanon, OH; Princeton City, OH
• Mariemont Grant ($9,000)- assisting Talawanda, OH; Lanesville, IN; South Montgomery, IN
• Northwest Local Grant ($4,000)- assisting Boone County, KY

The grants are funded by the Cinergy Foundation, which each year reinvests 1 percent of the pretax profits of its regulated operating companies in the communities it serves. Cinergy Corp. is the parent company of The Cincinnati Gas & Electric Co. Union Light Heat & Power Co. and PSI Energy Inc. serving 1.5 million electric customers and more than 500,000 gas customers in southwest Ohio, northern Kentucky and Indiana.