Highlights from the HACTC - Mar. 7

Hello HACTC Community,

I want to highlight the role that student voice plays in every aspect of our center. This week students took our annual Culture & Climate survey. We use this to help us continue to get better. A few comments that popped out for me are,

• "They really do encourage me, and actually care for my assignments quality. I was taken aback by how much my work actually matters here"
• "I think you should push kids farther in education and learning."
• "Very welcoming school."
• "I feel like I have not learned everything I hoped to."

Sometimes it might feel like these surveys just go into the ether, but truly these survey results will be analyzed by our staff and will really help us make improvements.

Student voice is also a big part of our hiring process. For every position that we have, we have a student involved on the hiring committee. We recently brought in some finalists for a position and the a whole class of students was incredibly helpful in giving us their voice about the best candidate.

Students, thank you for sharing your voices. They are important.

Erika Schneider

HACTC Director

March 20 - Early Release. Morning operates like normal. For the afternoon we only have Hartford students.

March 21 - No School

At an assembly this week, we recognized students for embodying the fourth word in our motto, Work. These students get a certificate and some HACTC swag as a part of their recognition. Check out the Valley News article, coming soon, to see the winners!

In the CTE classroom, students have been working on setting career and life goals, as well as applying to the HACTC programs they'd like to enroll in next year. For math, they continued studying algebra, linear equations, fractions, and measurements. They are also reading The Hunger Games and learning how to write both business and "friendly" letters.

Recent CTE rotations through programs include Culinary Arts, where they helped make gingerbread houses, risotto, and cookies; Business, Entrepreneurship, and Marketing, where they collaborated on creating vending machine proposals and board games; and Automotive Technology, where they got to complete oil changes, look at exhaust systems, and inflate tires.

In Culinary, both levels have been involved in catering jobs, including the HACTC Open House for prospective students in January, and running the new Getaway Restaurant at Farmvu. There are also five students from each level who will compete in the Vermont Iron Chef competition on Saturday, March 29!

Additionally, level I recently competed in a Chili Cookoff - each team made a different recipe, from pumpkin bean chili, to burrito-inspired chili, and different varieties of traditional chili. Staff and students from all of the other afternoon HACTC programs got to taste test and vote for their favorites. In the classroom, level I students have started an introduction to nutrition, learning about the importance of healthy eating and meal planning on a budget. Next week, they'll tour three different establishments in the Upper Valley and learn about food service in a residential community, retail production kitchen, and fine dining restaurant.

In level II, students completed the ServSafe Food Handler program and assessment. They have been learning about butchery, including beef and chicken fabrication. Several students just started co-op experiences at a variety of businesses and food service operations in the Upper Valley. Others are helping launch a Bakeshop Pop-Up at the HACTC and hope to continue that through the end of the school year to bring more student-produced food to the HACTC/HHS community.

The afternoon IT class recently wrapped up the first half of their CompTIA A+ certification curriculum (Core I) and is moving onto Core II, which covers system administration, computer operating systems, and basic cybersecurity. Students also started different co-ops with the Hartford School District IT office, the Dartmouth College Computer Store, and providing tech support to the public at Kilton Library and Bugbee Senior Center.

The morning Software Development class has continued to learn Python programming fundamentals and will soon begin capstone projects of their choosing that they will work on for the rest of the year. Some Software Development students are also participating in co-ops at Retail Control Systems, Mascoma Valley Regional School District IT, and Dartmouth College Research Computing.

Additionally, three students in the program are extending their learning by taking Introduction to Cybersecurity through Champlain College.

The median salary for CNC operators in the Upper Valley is $52,116.