Eighth graders got the chance to get motivated, exploring their possible career options with a new event. Naperville District 203 partnered with local businesses to bring them all together at the Naperville Yard on Friday.
“Career Motive-8 is an event for all of our eighth grade students,” said Sue Jin Striedl, Project Manager for Learning Services. “It is a part of Naperville District 203. This event is for all of our students to be motivated, engage and explore different career pathways within the state of Illinois, and (Learning Services) is partnering with all these districts.”
Career Motive-8’s goal was to give hands-on experience to students, aligning with D203’s counseling curriculum. This was the first year of the event.
“We have been formulating this idea for a number of years,” said Riedel. “In order to engage students and help them start thinking about plans after high school. One of the things we wanted to provide was a hands-on interactive opportunity for students for them to learn about different careers and different pathways.”
Roughly 150 individuals and businesses were represented at the event, as 1,200 students from all five Jr. high schools visited the various career booths.
“We have seven different pathways including everything from agriculture, finance, IT, all the way to engineering and manufacturing,” said Riedel. “All of these different pathways provide students different opportunities from trades all the way to things that may require a professional degree.”
Executive Director for the Downtown Naperville Alliance Danielle Tufano represented her organization’s table during Career Motive-8.
“We focused on things like event planning, budget building and advocating for businesses, and just different parts of what we do at our office,” said Tufano. “Then we handed out Smarties because eighth graders are smart.”
Tufano was happy eighth-graders received a chance to learn from people in a variety of fields during Friday’s event.
“I think it’s great that District 203 is starting this early because when I was younger we started thinking about our careers toward the end of high school,” said Tufano. “(The process) felt a bit rushed. So I think getting those thoughts into a younger mind so they can start considering different fields is brilliant.”
Naperville News 17’s Will Payne reports.
If you have a story idea, we want to hear from you!
