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Punxsutawney Phil-ins: Job shadowers go to work

Alejandra Navarro
Record-Journal
Tuesday, February 23, 2000

Wallingford - Drew Kingsley traded in his T-shirt for a button-down shirt Tuesday and spent the day in the working world. >Drew would ordinarily be in is eighth-grade classes at Moran Middle School, but on Groundhog Day, he shadowed employees at Forza Technology Solutions. Forza employees expected to entertain the students with the Internet, but the students shadowing the employees wanted to work. Drew and Matthew Griffith worked with the databases and played with the graphic designs. The work was slightly different than Drew expected, but he remained enthusiastic about a career in computer programming.

"It's good to see focus," said Dan Holden, a consultant for Forza, explained the process of creating forms with sketches on a dry-erase board. The computer field is the wave of the future, he said.

The more experience they get the better off they will be as adults," Holden said. This year, about 300 Southern Connecticut students participated in the Groundhog Job Shadow program, sponsored by the Junior Achievement of Southern Connecticut. The town's high school students will participate today.

Thousands of students from across the country will also participate in the national event, designed to expose students to careers.

Wallingford included 10 eighth-grade students in the Student Enrichment Program at Moran as the first middle-school participants in the Groundhog Job Shadow program.

The School-to-Career program in Wallingford, funded by the Board of Education, hopes to expose more students to careers at an earlier age so they can better prepare for the future. The district has always had a career component in the schools, but now it is a more structured program, said Gail McCormack, Schools-to-Career coordinator, who organized the event with local businesses.

"You really need to start planning ahead," Gracey said. Students in eighth grade are already choosing classes for next year. "Course selection will determine whether or not they will go to college."

Justin Symington, who spent the day with the staff at Innovative Internet Marketing Solutions, agrees with Gracey. He spent time upgrading a Web page for one of the company's clients, including adding a graphic button that linked to a table or mortgage rates, which he also created.

"I think a lot of people should do this," Justin said. "Now is the time when you should be looking at what you want to do in the future."

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