MOUNT JACKSON — Eighth graders in Shenandoah County toured Triplett Tech last week to learn about possible future careers and how the vocational school could help with their training.
Peter Muhlenberg eighth graders visited Triplett Tech on Monday and Signal Knob and North Fork attended Tuesday.
Triplett Tech holds an eighth grade and 10th-grade career exploration every year. The programs offered at the school are not available to students until they are in the 11th and 12th grades.
During the exploration fair, the eighth graders had an opportunity to get hands-on experience and insight on eight of the 16 course offerings at Triplett Tech. Triplett Tech will host its 10th-grade career exploration fair later in the year.
A. Page Cross, culinary arts instructor at the school, spoke about the importance of getting exposure to various career options at a young age.
“Eighth grade lets them see like ‘wow, what is available in this school?” Cross said. “…If they don’t have an opportunity to see what’s going on here then they don’t know if they have these options available. They don’t see that at [their] home school, they only see that if they come here.”
Kendall Neese and Emily Frank, both current culinary arts students, visited Triplett Tech when they were in the eighth grade and led demonstrations for the eighth graders this week.
“I think it’s good you visit in eighth and 10th grade,” Kendall said.
“I think they’re very important, cause there’s a lot of counties that don’t do it,” Emily added. “Like my mom is a teacher, so she has connections with other counties and there’s one county that is starting to have this program and there’s a lot of jumping at it because they want that instead of just the introduction to culinary at their regular schools.”
The second year of the culinary arts program emphasizes the business aspect.
“If you’re going to use this to your advantage and make a business out of it, then you need to learn — What kind of crowd do you want to bring in? Do you want to be local? Do you want to be near a farm so it can be farm to table instead of going to the grocery store?,” Kendall said.
Automotive technology instructor Ryan Judy said he has seen an increased interest in institutions like Triplett Tech and trade schools in general.
“I think it’s growing more all of the time. I think the kids are seeing the trades, liking the trades, it’s becoming more popular,” Judy said.
Triplett Tech Principal and Director of CTE Todd Lynn emphasized the importance of Triplett Tech students being the ones to lead and present the information at the open houses.
“We really try to let this be student-run, so we have students leading the tours,” Lynn said. “…when we have other kids teaching kids and they can do it right, we know we’re headed down the right path.”