LAKEWOOD Lakewood High School commemorated National Career and Technical Education Week by recognizing the achievements of its own CTE students at its annual Career and Technical Education First Semester Awards Breakfast Feb. 15 in the LHS commons.
LHS Class of 1991 alumnus Leonard Dietlin was the breakfasts guest speaker. He described his career with AMT, which manufactures technology for companies such as Boeing, and asserted that the CTE courses he took at LHS paved the way toward a career path that hes found fulfilling.
I was exposed to a variety of classes and career choices through CTE, and I discovered that I love to work with my hands, said Dietlin, who brought parts from the toolboxes and overhead bins of his job to the podium as he spoke.
From the local photo lab to the surgical lasers they show being used to operate on elephants on the Discovery Channel, I can tell my son that I made parts in those machines, he added. If you have the slightest interest in any of these subjects, then take advantage of these opportunities to learn them, because any one of them might be the class that makes you say, This is the career field for me.
LHS Principal Kevin Allen made a special award presentation to CTE Department Scholar Jessica Nelson, honoring her for her exemplary character.
Jessica is cheerful, hard-working, articulate and responsible, and she inspires others to do their best, said Allen of Nelson, both as a student at LHS and as a tutor at Cougar Creek Elementary.
In the Health and Human Services Awards, Linda Steiner commended her Family Health students as quiet, high-caliber students, singling out Outstanding FCCLA Leader Kyra Willett for coordinating a toiletries collection drive for the homeless and runaway teens of Cocoon House.
Hartmut Schmakeit selected his Agriculture Award-winning Greenhouse students by asking himself, Who do I count on? I give these to the busiest student, who do the work I give them, then do more, and do it right, the whole period. These kids come to class with a work ethnic, and their parents should take some credit for that.
The Technology and Industry Awards were chosen by Tom OHara, who has praised his students in Wood Technology, Technical Design and Architecture as diligent and proactive independent workers who are always into their work, asking me what they can do better.
Heidi Hesselman stepped in for an absent Paula Boyce to help hand out Business and Marketing Awards to Boyce and Bob Walkers Accounting, Recordkeeping, Computer Applications and Office Technology students.
These students are the kind of kids you want to hire. Theyre reliable and dependable. They like to go to work, and they avoid playing games, said Walker, while Hesselman passed on Boyces pride in her students.
In the other Business and Marketing Awards, Stacy Tronsdals students in Careers, Introduction to Marketing and Advanced Marketing were lauded for their dedication and energy, while Hesselman stepped in again, this time for Andrea Sather, to give Career Center Awards for Outstanding Teachers Aide to Jake Zuanich and Ashley Clifton.
Hesselman concluded by naming Isaac Nickerson the Outstanding Teachers Aide Cougar Path Award winner, noting that he did really some boring stuff for me, but I did what I wanted and I appreciate it.