FILE —In this photo from 2019, Lima City Schools Superintendent Jill Ackerman discusses career technical programs at Lima Senior High School, alongside students Jawan Anderson and Te’Osha Williams.
File photo | The Lima News
LIMA — Career technical education provides students with the academic and technical skills, knowledge and training necessary to succeed in future careers. Lima City Schools features twelve programs — including the latest agriculture and outdoor opportunities and audio engineering — to prepare students to enter the workforce.
Lima Senior Principal Tyler Turner said, “We’re constantly looking to expand and just build any pathway that our students are interested in pursuing. It’s really grown to the point where it’s becoming a foundation or staple of the high school.”
Lima City Schools will be hosting “A Taste of Career Tech,” an opportunity for the public to enjoy a free lunch at Lima Senior’s Spartan Inn and then tour the school’s career tech programs.
There will be two dates from which to choose: Wednesday, Feb. 15, and Wednesday, Feb. 22. Lunch prepared by Lima Senior culinary students will begin at 11 a.m., with the tour beginning by 11:45 a.m.
The tour will include short visits to all of Lima Senior’s 12 programs: ag and outdoor occupations, audio engineering, auto technology, construction trades, culinary and food service management, early childhood education, engineering technology, graphic communications, marketing education, patient care technology and welding and metal fabrication.
Reservations are required by Feb. 10 for the first event and Feb. 17 for the second. Please call 419-996-3411 or email [email protected].
The career tech program at the Lima City School has a four year graduation rate of eighty-nine percent. The rate of placing students into the workforce following graduation is also high.
The growth of career tech has prompted the city schools to expand with a new building at the former Emerson School location at the corner of Boyer and Edwards streets. There will be two buildings – one for agriculture and one for engineering.
The projected cost of the new facilities is 2.9 million dollars. The funding is coming from CARES Act funds. The building will provide much needed space for robotics, 3D printing and a computer numeric controlled machine which is an automated manufacturing technique that allows for fast, efficient and repetitive cutting, boring, drilling, machining and fabricating of material by computer-controlled devices. The Ag building will have enough room for welding and woodworking labs as well as a conference room.
Reach Dean Brown at 567-242-0409
