At the meeting of the McDonald County R-1 School District Board of Education tonight, director of student services Adam Lett will address the board about Vocational Rehabilitation summer work experience.
The program started two years ago in partnership with Vocational Rehab and is designed to offer job opportunities to special education/disabled students, he said. The program is funded through the state. Students will be paid an hourly wage and will shadow an adult. There will be six to eight students per site, and the number of sites depends on how many students sign up for the program. Some students will be at elementary schools learning cooking or custodial skills or to be a teacher's aide or office aide. Last year 'Stangs was one of the sites and Anderson Elementary School was the other.
Students will learn interviewing skills and money management. They have to be a junior or a senior to participate. It is a four-week program during summer school.
"Our goal is to help all of our students to graduate high school and either go on to a two- or four-year school or get gainful employment," Lett said. "This helps students who may or may not go to college get a post-high school job."
Also tonight, High School Principal Greg Leach will present a proposal about eSports. He said in eSports, students compete in a league to play video games against other schools. There are nationwide leagues, and students can earn scholarships in eSports, he said. Missouri Valley College is adding eSports as a college sport and offering scholarships, he said. There is no traveling involved -- games are played in the school's building, he said.
"All the games we are playing are either (rated) 'T for Teen' or 'E for Everyone,'" he added. "League of Legends is one." The team would participate in multiplayer video game competitions.
"Since we've been in the process of adding it, two other schools in the Big 8 have contacted me wanting information on the dynamics of starting a team," Leach said. "Our hope is there is a group of students out there that aren't involved in anything else, so this would be another chance for students to be involved. It's reaching kids that we don't normally get to."
General News on 01/11/2018