As the new Perham High School nears completion, we are taking time to describe the spaces and features of the facility. We have introduced you to the Commons, which is the central hub that the rest of the school is organized around. Then we brought you to the academic wing, where STEM and Humanities subjects will be hosted. In this third segment, we’ll focus on the Career & Technical Education portion of the building.
Career and technical education (CTE) is an important part of high school curriculum. CTE programs provide a variety of opportunities in industrial trades, agriculture, business, and culinary and family health services. With all of the business and industry in our area, we have an opportunity to grow and learn alongside our business partners. Industry, in particular, is a large part of who we are as a community and why we thrive.
When you look at the high school, you’ll see an adjacent building that is joined to the main building with a short connection. This building is an extension of the academic wing housing the industrial trades programs, as well as the Perham Area Learning Center.
The structure of the CTE side is similar to we would see in industry. It’s a large metal building that provides large open spaces. The building was constructed with a high bay, open concept which creates a flexible work environment for a variety of projects to co-exist. With the wide open design, all facets of CTE world are tied together and incorporated in one spaces. Students will be working on metal fabrication, welding, machining, carpentry, mechatronics, and more.
Students will be working on projects in spaces that align with our business partners in the industrial trades. Our goal is to “home grow” employees for our local businesses and partners by teaching our students what they can expect in various trades. They also gain real life skills and knowledge that can be quickly translated into full-time employment after high school or a short stint in trade school.
Students will be working on the exact same equipment that is seen in our local industry. Mechatronics is a great example. It is a wide-used technology combining electronics and mechanical engineering. This new building has a special mechatronics lab, and it is a component that we partner directly with KLN Family Brands on.
Welding is another component that we can expand immensely on in this new space. Students will be exposed to four different types of welding. With new equipment, we can expose students to each of those types in one single piece of equipment. This new equipment is going to allow us to partner with Brunswick on aluminum welding, which is new for us.
Throughout the past few years, we have built a partnership with Eleva-Strum High School in Strum, Wisconsin. They started Cardinal Manufacturing, which is a 100% student driven career tech ed business. Students take on various roles in the business, such as business manager, marketing, sales, and technical skills workers in welding, machining, carpentry, and more. We are taking that concept and doing a spin off of our own – Jacket Manufacturing. With this new building and better technology, we can better encourage collaboration amongst students, staff, and business partners.
These are just a few examples of the various partnerships that we can build with industry partners in our area that can have direct benefits for both parties. The growth of partners in our area is a continuous process that we hope will grow into the future. The CTE building was designed for growth, and we hope to one day see an expansion of the trades in an effort to align ourselves more with industry.
To learn more about the building process, click here. Stay tuned for the next segment of Meet Your New Perham High School!
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