Wednesday, July 28, 2010
Education notebook: Students can sample career smorgasbord
A program gives Roanoke fifth-graders the hands-on opportunity to explore various career programs that will be available to them.
JEANNA DUERSCHERL The Roanoke Times
Auto body teacher Mike Toney talks to fifth-graders Monday in the 5-5-5 program.
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A group of Roanoke fifth-graders is spending five days exploring five career fields at Roanoke Technical Education Center, adjacent to the campus of Patrick Henry High School.
The 5-5-5 program is designed to give city students a glimpse of opportunities in culinary arts, auto repair, robotics, Web page design, fashion design and marketing, health and medicine, sports and entertainment marketing, cosmetology and TV/video production.
"It is a great chance for them, going into middle school, to think about life beyond school," said Vella Wright, the division's assistant superintendent for teaching and learning.
The rising sixth-graders, many of them in the city's summer school program, picked their top five choices and began rotating Monday. Culinary students cooked spaghetti and meatballs, which they ate for lunch with a fresh salad they chopped; cosmetology students shampooed and styled a mannequin's hair; and Web page design students used Microsoft Publisher to build a website.
In a health and medicine class taught Monday by Principal Kathy Duncan, students performed a simulated blood typing lab exercise. Duncan shared a scenario with the class: A family, including a 5-year-old boy, had been in a serious car wreck. The child needs a blood transfusion and four family members come in to donate, but the class has to determine who is a match by testing drops of simulated blood types in small plastic trays.
The students "become interested and don't even know they are doing science," Duncan said.
One wall of the health and medicine classroom is decorated with health care profession posters, including ones depicting an emergency medical technician, a radiographer, a respiratory therapist, a licensed practical nurse, a dental hygienist and a therapeutic recreation technician to show students the range of careers offered in the field.
"I took this one [health and medicine] because I am going into the military," said Sammy Thomas, 12, who is slated to begin sixth grade at James Breckinridge Middle School in September.
Sammy said he may pursue medical training through the military.
The 5-5-5 program continues today, Thursday and Monday.
