Have you ever fantasized about an exciting career in the fashion industry or high-paying job working on computers or designing the Internet? But, those types of careers mean spending a lot of years in school, right? Well, many of Union City’s high school students are finding out that these careers are much more reachable than they think.
Union City’s new Career Academy, located on 19th and West streets in the St. Michael’s Monastery site, began classes on Oct. 1.
The center is a satellite education program that falls under the administration of Emerson High school. “We don’t need big monuments as schools,” said Superintendent of Schools Thomas Highton. “We are using satellite sights so that the students can get the education that they need”
The Board of Education has partnered with major corporations such as The Fashion Institute of Technology and American Airlines among others to help students gain skills needed to enter the workforce. “These programs prepares students for work,” said director of the academy Richard Quagliariello, who added that the first career center was opened in Philadelphia in 1969 for at-risk students. “These are skills not offered in a traditional high school,” he said.
“Not only are we creating additional classes to alleviate the over crowding problem,” said Board of Education Vice President Lenny Calvo, “but at the same time, we are educating students to improve social skills in many different areas hands-on.”
Calvo added, “The concept is to keep the kids in school.”
Planning your future
Reading, writing and topologies? Most people don’t even know what a topology is, but after enrolling in the two-year Cisco program, where the Board of Education partnered with Cisco Systems, a worldwide networking company for the Internet, some of the city’s high school students will be able to teach us what topologies are and how to create them.
According to Frank Calise, the director of the Cisco program, topologies are the different devices used to create a computer network.
“These students are learning to design the Internet of the future,” said Calise, who added that after completing this course, the students will graduate with a Cisco certificate as well as a high school diploma. “There will be guaranteed employment for these students,” said Calise. “They will be able to walk out of high school and get a job at $40,000 a year.”
The Cisco program is not the only program that guarantees employment upon completion. “American Airlines has guaranteed that the students who go through this program will get a job,” said Highton.
The American Airlines program, directed by Carmen Alarco, teaches students how to work at any job in the travel and tourism field. The students are taught how to use the same computer reservation system as American Airlines uses in its airports.
“It is as if we were at the airport,” said Alarco.
This two-year program includes one-year of on-the-job training with an internship at American Airlines in the second year.
Some of the center’s programs, like the supermarket program that has been running out of Union Hill High School for the past nine years, are four-year programs.
The supermarket program, working with Wakefern Food Corporation in Elizabeth, offers a complete supermarket, complete with a bakery and frozen food section, for the students to manage.
“This is a job-training program, said Scott Salotti a teacher in the program. “The longer [a student is] in the program the more responsibility [the student] gets”
The supermarket is also open for business.
“It is a great place for people in the near by neighborhood to go and shop,” said Calvo.
However, Highton also said that the center also encourages the students to obtain higher education. The center also works with Hudson County Community College and Lincoln Technical Institute.
The fashion design program, a four-year program working with the Fashion Institute in New York City, allows students to take classes at the school on Saturdays.
Students can also look forward to careers in computer-aided drafting, which is partnered with Lincoln Technical Institute and De Vry Institute, and early childhood education.
Serving the community
The center also offers these programs at night to the city’s residents. Classes for adults are held on Saturdays and at night.
“Not enough people know about the great programs we have,” said Union City Mayor Brian Stack. “[This center is] opening up our schools to all of the residents of the community.”
“The community really needs programs like this.,” said Alarco, who will be teaching the American Airlines programs at night.
“Our community really has a thirst for education,” said Highton.