Workforce readiness class coming to high school
Beginning next semester, up to 40 Brown County High School students will have the opportunity to take a class, learn workforce readiness skills and then get paid when they graduate.
Superintendent Laura Hammack announced at the Sept. 21 Brown County School Board of Trustees meeting that the school district had been named a ready school for the Jobs for American Graduates program.
Students identified to take part in the program will learn workforce and career readiness skills from a classroom curriculum before being encouraged to participate in internships and ultimately engage in the workforce, Hammack said.
The program is free to the district. The teacher will be an employee of Vincennes University who will come to Brown County to teach the course. Vincennes University will pay and train the teacher, Hammack said.
The high school is only required to find a classroom for the course.
In order to keep funding, the school must enroll between 20 and 40 students.
Students who participate will be paid several hundred dollars if they graduate, then are eligible to be paid every quarter after graduation if they allow JAG to track them and what they are doing in the workforce. The data will be used to prove the effectiveness of the program long-term, Hammack said.
Along with high graduation rates, “they are also finding engagement in either post-secondary education or workforce as a result of being part of this program,” she said.
The school district is guaranteed two years of funding. The program was expanded to 10 schools this year and is a national initiative.
“We didn’t apply, didn’t do anything; we just got the phone call,” Hammack said.
Guidance counselors are working on identifying students now for the program. Junior and seniors with academic, environmental, work-related or other barriers that are getting in the way of success will be targeted.
“This is a good thing for kids entering the workforce. It’s very targeted, very supportive and very long-term. They are wrapping arms around our kids for another year after they graduate,” Hammack said.
District Readiness Coordinator Christy Wrightsman said the JAG program is an extension of the Regional Opportunities Initiative Inc. in “a big way.”
“It’s sending the message of workforce development over and over again,” she said.
School board approves personnel changes
On Sept. 21 the Brown County School Board of Trustees approved the following:
- Separating Brown County Schools occupational therapist Angie Aumage, effective Oct. 30. This is a retirement.
- Appointing BCS special needs bus monitor Nichole Sebastian part-time without benefits, $10.25 per hour, 180 days, five hours per day, effective Sept. 11. She is a replacement for Teresa Carson.
- Appointing Van Buren Elementary School science fair coordinators Cynthia Baughman and Jayne Jones, $434 stipends.
- Appointing VBES Science Bowl coordinators Darlene Radloff and Tina Robertson, $279.50 stipends.
- Appointing Brown County High School assistant boys basketball coach Jonathan Bryce Boyer, $3,324 stipend. He is a replacement for Bailey Howard, who transferred to varsity assistant boys basketball coach, effective immediately, replacing Matt Noriega.
- Appointing Sprunica and Helmsburg Elementary schools PE instructor Alasa Harper, full-time with benefits, $15 per hour, five days per week, 7.25 hours per day, effective Oct. 2. She is a replacement for Thomas Planalp.
