{"id":197213,"date":"2025-09-16T21:16:23","date_gmt":"2025-09-17T02:16:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/?p=197213"},"modified":"2025-09-17T21:04:41","modified_gmt":"2025-09-18T02:04:41","slug":"high-schoolers-introduced-to-various-in-demand-jobs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/2025\/09\/16\/high-schoolers-introduced-to-various-in-demand-jobs\/","title":{"rendered":"Students introduced to in-demand jobs"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

SCOTT TRUXELL<\/strong>\/independent editor<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hundreds of high school freshman and sophomores from Van Wert, Paulding and Mercer counties spent some of school day on Tuesday at the Van Wert County Fairgrounds, getting hands-on exposure to a number of in-demand and skilled trades through the fourth annual “Build Your Future” program.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Van Wert, Crestview, Lincolnview, Wayne Trace, Paulding and Antwerp rotated through interactive career stations led by Vantage Career Center seniors who explained and demonstrated industry-related skills they\u2019ve learned to this point, then had students try their hand at the various stations. Van Wert County schools and Parkway attended the morning session, and the Paulding County schools were at the afternoon session. <\/p>\n\n\n

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Students had a chance to learn a bit about masonry during Tuesday’s Build Your Future event. Scott Truxell\/Van Wert independent<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

\u201cThe purpose is to gain some exposure for these kids to see what\u2019s really out there, to find out about skilled trades that they hear about,\u201d Van Wert High School Careers Counselor Kerry Koontz said. \u201cThis gives them an opportunity to get hands-on experience and to get a sense of what might be a future for them. Vantage does a great job coordinating with the economic development office and providing this event our students.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Among the businesses and organizations that participated were Danfoss, OhioHealth Van Wert Hospital, Paulding County Hospital, Alexander & Bebout, Ayers Mechanical Group, ATR Contractors, OhioMeansJobs, Paulding Economic Development, and the Van Wert Area Economic Development Corporation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt starts with Vantage Career Center and economic development offices in Van Wert County and Paulding County,\u201d said Lauren Buchanan, Workforce Development Manager with the Van Wert Area Economic Development Corporation. \u201cWe were able to bring in other businesses and for the first time we were able to bring in healthcare stakeholders and Danfoss, the largest employer in the county, so this is great exposure for those places as well to network and meet their future workforce essentially.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s well organized and the feedback is such that the kids lock in and they start looking ahead and want to attend Vantage for welding or carpentry or what have you,\u201d Koontz added. \u201cWe have great buy-in from our businesses here.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

Stations included construction and carpentry, masonry, welding, electric, HVAC, heavy equipment, manufacturing and health trades.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cA lot of the students are excited to hold tools for the first time or maybe they\u2019ve never stepped foot in a hospital for a personal experience,\u201d Buchanan said. \u201cIt\u2019s really unique working with this age group because they were in late elementary school or early middle school when the pandemic happened and I think they were really the first kids constantly heard the term \u2018essential and non-essential\u2019 jobs, so they do have a keen interest in going for what\u2019s in-demand.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tuesday\u2019s event also showed students that they don\u2019t have to go far from home to find their future career path, hence, Build Your Future.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cEven though each county has their own school districts and their own economic development offices, we\u2019re not selfish \u2013 we just want these students to find meaningful employment after graduation,\u201d Buchanan said.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Students also learned about building framework. Scott Truxell photo<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

SCOTT TRUXELL\/independent editor Hundreds of high school freshman and sophomores from Van Wert, Paulding and Mercer counties spent some of school day on Tuesday at the Van Wert County Fairgrounds, getting hands-on exposure to a number of in-demand and skilled trades through the fourth annual “Build Your Future” program. Van Wert, Crestview, Lincolnview, Wayne Trace, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-197213","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-28 11:08:49","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/197213","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=197213"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/197213\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":197265,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/197213\/revisions\/197265"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=197213"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=197213"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=197213"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}