September 18, 2009

Wow, what a quick week! September is slipping away—but you can’t beat this beautiful weather.

This week has been one of meetings, meetings, meetings for me. I’ve had a chance to get out and meet all the new superintendents in our career-technical planning district (CTPD). We’ve got a lot of new faces this year! (And some familiar faces in new positions.) I like to get out and meet them in their districts and give them a quick overview of Ohio Hi-Point’s programs and our relationship with their respective districts. And I look forward to giving them a tour of our facilities at my first CTPD Superintendents Meeting on September 29! One note of interest—Dr. Bobby Moore, the new Superintendent at Mechanicsburg Local Schools, is a graduate of the Precision Machining Program at Dayton Patterson High School. (I shared with him that I’m also a graduate of a career-tech program—although I think quite a few years before he was!) He clearly understands and values what career-technical programs can mean to students.

This past Saturday, I had the opportunity to serve as a tour guide for the Union County Covered Bridge Festival. We went through training so that we could share information about the County’s many covered bridges with our bus-loads of tourists. It was a really fun experience and I learned so much! (I’d recommend taking the self-guided tour if you ever get the chance.) In one of my groups, there was a young man who looked to be about 10 or 11 who was absolutely fascinated with the architecture of the bridges. I asked him about his school, and in the course of our conversation and all the talk of bridges, it came up that his brother had attended Ohio Hi-Point in our Architectural Mechanical Design Program. He went on and on about the really cool bridge his brother had built for a competition, how lightweight it was, how strong it was (and why). I have to admit he pretty much lost me on the architectural details—but what wasn’t lost on me was his enthusiasm for the applied physics learning experience his brother had gotten at OHP! I told him I hoped he would be coming our way as an 11th grader—and I get the feeling he probably will be!

On Monday, I met with representatives from Honda’s Educational Outreach Program (at their request) to discuss how we can work more closely with Honda. With input from several staff members, we generated a lot of ideas for having them work with our students on employability and “soft” skills, possible internships, and of course our various advisory committees. And we also discussed several ways we might be able to help them with various projects within their vast organization. I’m looking forward to an even stronger relationship with this great corporate partner!

Wednesday at the Champaign County Community Improvement Corporation Meeting, Mary Lee Gecowetz, a member of the Grimes Field Airport Development Committee shared with the group that an aviator from another city who was in Urbana for the recent fly-in learned of our Aviation Occupations program and was absolutely astounded at the work our students are doing at such a young age. So astounded, as a matter of fact, that he’d like to replicate the program in his community! Shane recently shared a press release with all of you about three recent graduates from this program who are now attending college in aviation programs. It’s really great to see a new program develop and to see the “payoff” at the end of the road—students continuing their education in a career field they’ve found a passion for because of career-technical education!

Today you may see some “smaller” students on our campus. We have fourth graders visiting today and tomorrow as part of the Logan County Agriculture Tour. They are learning about our renewable energy and energy-saving projects on campus such as wind and solar energy, geothermal heating and cooling, and composting. We’re glad to be able to host this event, show off our campus, and hopefully be recruiting a few students for the incoming class of 2016! Thanks to all of you who have given of your time, talents, and lab space to make this project possible.

I’ll end with a kind of cute story about one of our students. I was in the lunch line this week and recognized the young man in front of me as one of our Culinary Arts students. I told him I heard his class was going on a field trip to Gordon Foods. He said very earnestly and without missing a beat, “It’s not a field trip. Field trips are just another excuse for getting out of school. It’s a study trip and we have a lesson planned that we’ll be studying on the trip.” I told him I was sure he’d learn a lot and have a great time as well! (And obviously someone has been teaching him the importance of making the most of “study” trips!)

Have a great weekend!