Ten years ago, USC was looking for more ways to use its position as a leading academic institution to make a difference in the neighborhoods that surround the campus.

It already had started the USC Family of Schools, where the university partnered with five schools in the Exposition and University Park communities to provide educational, cultural and development opportunities.

But in 1996 the discussion veered from academic enrichment to safety as school principals and administrators asked university officials to use its leadership position in a very different manner.

“Principals and school administrators pointed out that if children were fearful about their personal safety, they did not perform well at their studies,” said Katharine A. Díaz, director of Community Outreach for USC Civic and Community Relations. “So USC, the schools, public safety and community representatives put their heads together and created the USC Family of Schools Kid Watch Program.”

Kid Watch recruits volunteers to watch over kids on their way to and from school and marks safe houses along routes to the schools.

“At the time we thought the schools would want academic enrichment classes,” Díaz said. But what they wanted was a way for kids to feel safe.”

To celebrate a decade of keeping kids safe, USC threw a party. Close to 400 Kid Watch members and their families came out for a picnic, to ride ponies and watch a magic show on June 10. The USC Department of Public Safety gave away 37 bikes, and the Children’s Collective taught youngsters about bike and pedestrian safety.

Eight of the original 25 volunteers also were honored during the festivities.

“This was our way of saying, ‘Thank you,’ ” Díaz said.

Jauny Molina, whose daughter was in the third grade in 1996, was part of the pioneering group that first year. The program wasn’t an easy sell, she recalled.

“I think we needed it. But sometimes it’s hard to move the parents to do something when the police are involved,” Molina said. “They are scared and they don’t know what’s going to happen. But little by little, they saw they could do something. And we learned our neighborhood was like a family.”

Molina is still involved even though her daughter is 19 and about to get her emergency medical technician certificate.

Today more than 900 neighbors watch over 9,000 children walk home every day as they spill out from nine schools.

The result of Kid Watch is that kids feel safer – and not just at USC.

Kid Watch spawned copycat programs all over Los Angeles County, with variations sprinkled across the country and an interest in the program from around the world. USC has made recreating the program easy with a step-by-step, how-to manual on its Web site.

The program is a partnership between the Los Angeles Unified School District, the Los Angeles Police Department and USC.

The safe houses are marked with a yellow sticker in the shape of a house with stick figures of a boy and girl inside. Before volunteers get their sticker, they go through a background check, donated by the Southwest Division of the Los Angeles Police Department.

“People feel safer because of Kid Watch,” said LAPD Senior Lead Officer Gary Cantu. “They know each other. They get motivated to get more involved. It gives them a sense of ownership.”

Kid Watch is funded by a USC Neighborhood Outreach grant through faculty and staff contributions to the USC Good Neighbors Campaign.

For more information, visit http://www.usc.edu/ext-relations/ccr/programs/kid_watch.