Why Wall Rocks Series – #11 We Have Careers!

2 Apr 2018


Newsletter

Wall is a small community with tremendous opportunity. People of all ages can start a career, launch a business and create a life right here in Wall.

On March 29th, the Badlands Bad River Regional Economic Development Partnership (BBR) held the 2018 College and Career Expo at the Wall School. The event’s goal was to expose students to the variety of career opportunities throughout the BBR Region including: Wall, Philip, Kadoka and New Underwood. Students from Wall, Kadoka and New Underwood high schools attended the event.

The expo consisted of two parts: Career Round Tables discussion and the College and Career Expo.

What are Career Round Tables?

The first half of the event featured Career Round Table discussions. The Career Round Tables were added to the College and Career Expo to allow students to learn about potential careers from community members living and working in the region.

The Career Round Tables were organized around the South Dakota Department of Education’s 16 Career Clusters. According to the SD Department of Education’s website, the career clusters are designed to help students acquire the knowledge and skills they need to reach their postsecondary and career goals.

Prior to the event, students filled out a questionnaire to help them identify which cluster best fit their interests and skill sets. Students could choose to spend ten minutes each with three different career fields. Students asked questions about how the individuals got to where they are today, what education was required, what their day-to-day job consists of, and any other questions they were interested in asking!

The clusters represented during the Career Round Tables included:

  • Agriculture
  • Architecture and Construction
  • Business Management and Administration, HR and Entrepreneurship
  • Education
  • Finance
  • Government and Public Administration
  • Health Science
  • Hospitality and Tourism
  • Human Services
  • Information Technology
  • Law, Public Safety and Security
  • Maintenance and Utilities
  • Manufacturing
  • Marketing and Communications
  • Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics
  • Transportation and Logistics

Who attended the College and Career Expo?

Armed with knowledge from the Career Round Table discussions, students spent the second half of the event visiting with colleges, technical institutions and area employers.

Colleges, universities and technical institutes in attendance included:

  • Black Hills State University
  • Dakota Wesleyan University
  • National American University
  • Northern State University
  • South Dakota State University
  • University of South Dakota
  • Mitchell Technical Institute
  • Southeast Technical Institute
  • Headlines Academy

A representative from the Build Dakota Scholarship fund attended to compliment the technical institute opportunities. The Build Dakota Scholarship fund awards full scholarships to students entering high-need workforce programs at South Dakota technical institutes.

South Dakota Army National Guard also attended to represent military opportunities.

Several businesses attended to share available jobs, internships and to connect with students. The businesses in attendance included:

  • Badlands Distillery
  • Badlands National Park
  • Best Western Plains Motel
  • Cedar Pass Lodge
  • First National Bank in Philip
  • Golden West Telecommunications
  • National Grasslands Visitor Center
  • Philip Health Services
  • Pennington County State’s Attorney Office
  • Swiftec
  • Wall Dairy Queen
  • Wall Drug Store
  • West River Electric Association

Why is this important?

In order to maintain and grow our community, our youth need to be aware of all the fantastic career opportunities in Wall. The BBR team would like to sincerely thank all of the volunteers that helped make the event possible as well as the Wall School faculty and staff for their support!

As always, thank you for being such a great community. It is because of you we have it all in Wall!

Cheyenne McGriff
WEDC Executive Director
(605) 279-2658
walledd@gwtc.net

 

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