Creating opportunities

It’s human nature to feel needed. Whether it’s within our family circle, at school, or in a career, we all want to know we are making a contribution to society and making a difference. That’s one of the goals of a new class at Eagle Grove High School taught by Special Education teacher Geri Winge.

Winge has been working with her students over the course of this last year to help them gain real world experience and prepare them for what the future will hold for them after graduation. She has been working the School-To-Work program with her students not only to help them learn what might be expected of them on a job site, but also to help them find things they love to do that could perhaps turn into a job for them. Some enjoy cleaning and have taken on several different tasks at various businesses around town, like helping them vacuum, sweep or dust. Others have found they like helping kids while being a teacher’s assistant.

Of course, Winge said they couldn’t do it without the much appreciated cooperation of local businesses like Ben Franklin, Eagle Grove Elementary, Moffitt Dental, State Farm, and Prestage just to name a few. She, and her students, are grateful that they, and others businesses like them, allow them to come into their stores and learn how to be a valuable employee.

The School-To-Work has had so much success in it’s first year that the Clarion-Goldfield-Dows High School Special Education class even came to join them for a session one day. Of course. they didn’t go along to the work sites, but the CGD students did get to hear first-hand from the Eagle Grove students about their experiences and how much they enjoyed it.

For the full story, see this week's Eagle Grove Eagle. Subscribe by calling 1-800-558-1244 ext 122 or email Deb at circulation@midamericapub.com or by clicking here.