May 8, 2015 at 3:53 p.m.
Life on the road
Careers on Wheels demonstrates potential jobs to students
Life on the road
The annual Careers on Wheels event took place Thursday morning. Students from several schools had the opportunity to tour vehicles from businesses around the area and learn about the careers associated with them. School District of Rhinelander Community Education Coordinator Mike Cheslock said the annual event has grown into something both students and businesses look forward to every year.
"This is our fifth annual Careers on Wheels program," he said. "I believe it started as a Leadership of Oneida County project and now Partners in Education has taken it over. It's a program designed to introduce job opportunities to third-, fourth- and fifth-graders in the community."
While touring the different vehicles is certainly a highlight for the students, Cheslock said what makes the event worthwhile is the knowledge the kids are gaining.
"It's a career exploration program and we do it in a way that we hope the kids find interesting," he said. "We're teaching them in a way where they don't even realize we're teaching them anything. It's fun for them and they get to tour the vehicles. We have representatives from different businesses and organizations that are talking to them about their careers. It's a great learning opportunity."
While there were a number of familiar faces from last year's event, Cheslock said he always tries to cycle in some new stations to keep the event from getting stale.
"We have some businesses that are here every year for us," he said. "We try to introduce a few new ones every year. Sometimes people can't make it, so we find replacements for them. Usually, we have between 20 and 25 stations set up and we try to keep it around that number. We try to introduce the kids to new things every year. They're really excited to see them. You can see their faces light up when they see something like a fire truck or the big crane from (Wisconsin) Public Service. All the vehicles are very interesting to the kids in different ways, so they're really engaged."
Kyle Leighton of Frasier's Plumbing, Heating and Cooling was on hand to walk the students through their equipment. He said it's fun to represent his place of employment.
"It's nice to be able to provide a little knowledge of what we do," he said. "They seem to recognize our trucks and to connect some information to that is really great. It seems like they're into it and they're asking good questions. They seem to be pretty knowledgeable about what our company does. We're trying to hit on the safety factors with them and they're pretty well versed in why that's important."
Charles Whittaker of Eastside Automotive was there with a tow truck. He said he was happy to talk to the students about his job.
"We figured it would be a fun thing to present to the kids so they could see what our job is like," he said. "We want them to know what we do and they really enjoy seeing the truck."
Andy Hildebrand may be reached at [email protected].
Comments:
You must login to comment.