Benton Community’s 8th Graders Target Their Future

On May 19, 2010, the Benton Community Middle School 8th graders explored a variety of careers at Kirkwood Community College in Cedar Rapids. Benton school staff and Kirkwood staff worked with the Workplace Learning Connection to coordinate this campus-wide effort, showing the students that it's not too early to start looking into their future. The event brought home the message that they will be part of the workforce before they know it!

Morning activities included hands-on activities about careers in Industrial Technology, Agricultural Science and Business & Information Technology. Lunch was at the Equestrian Center, where the students were treated to a horse show and presentations by Kirkwood representatives for Student Life, the KICK Middle School camps, and High School Career Edge Academies.

After lunch, the students got moving. They toured the Recreation Center and the Health Simulation Laboratory and met in the conference room of the newly renovated Kirkwood Center to learn about the progress of the soon-to-be-opened Kirkwood Hotel.

When holding the hardware from a disemboweled computer to learn about computer hard-drive basics, one student, Christine Pfannebecker, exclaimed, “I'm amazed – not even kidding!” A Benton Community teacher said about the Health Simulation Lab tour, “That was worth the whole day right there!” There were several comments such as, “I never knew you could do that” to “I had no idea”, proving the point that career education can and should also be learned outside of the classroom.

Target Your Future is a Workplace Learning Connection program in partnership with various Kirkwood Community College departments. Benton Community School District partners with Workplace Learning Connection to provide career education to their K-12 students.