The future generations of the Greene County community paid a visit to Waynesburg University March 26 for Career Day.
Fifth-graders from the Carmichaels School District, Central Greene School District, Jefferson-Morgan School District, Southeastern Greene School District and West Greene School District took part in the event.
The five districts came to campus to learn about what kind of careers they could obtain with a degree from the programs at the university.
Students currently enrolled at Waynesburg separately launched 15 minute presentations on each different program Waynesburg University has to offer.
The featured programs that had been represented were the departments of communication, chemistry, criminal justice, math and computer science, humanities, education and fine arts.
Sarah Bell, advisor for The Yellow Jacket and academic communications coordinator, worked with faculty from the university while organizing the event with her student assistant, Olivia Kelley.
Together, Bell and Kelley, worked with the members of the Greene County Career and Technology Center [GCCTC], located down the street from the university.
Katie Sleasman, a guidance counselor at GCCTC, worked with Bell and Kelley, splitting up the large group of fifth graders in order for all those attending to have the opportunity to visit campus.
“The Greene County Career and Technology Center kind of started this process,” said Bell. “There were about 400 total fifth-graders in Greene County, which was a lot for either Waynesburg or Greene County Career and Technology Center to host all at once. So we split them, 200 at Waynesburg and 200 at the center.”
Due to the large number of children, they switched the split groups in the afternoon, allowing everyone to see both facilities.
While at Waynesburg, the elementary schoolers visited the Goodwin Performing Arts Center, Stover Center and the Paul R. Stewart Science Hall to watch the presentations.
The GCCTC programs of study that are offered are; automotive technology, automotive collision, building construction, computer information technology, cosmetology, culinary arts, electrical occupations, emergency services, health assistant, precision machining, sports medicine and rehabilitation and welding/fabrication.
Career Day was a day of new experiences for the fifth-graders of Greene County and during their visit at Waynesburg, the featured departments had many events planned for them.
Kelley said that the criminal justice department had an interactive activity for the children. “Criminal justice showed them how to properly handcuff somebody,” Bell added.
Overall, the event was successful and Bell and Kelley received good reviews from the adults who watched over the fifth-graders during
their tour.
“It went smoothly, we heard positive feedback from all the teachers that chaperoned the students,” said Bell.
The children of the Greene County community were given access to a deeper look of what their futures could potentially hold following the excitement and new experiences from Career Day at Waynesburg University.