Career days are common offerings at our schools and typically include parents and community members invited in to share their occupations and trades with students. The pandemic made in-person career days impossible this year, but many of our elementary schools still found ways to make career exploration possible.
At Tyler Elementary School, School Counselor Molly Moomau coordinated with some parents of students to provide prerecorded presentations about their lines of work. Featured professions included job coach, market research, pediatrician, phlebotomy, registered dietitian, subject matter expert, and veterinarian.
Moomau and Tyler Elementary teachers found that the online delivery of career day had some perks.
"The bonus of doing this virtually was that we
got to visit some of these workplaces," offered Tammy Moye, fifth-grade teacher.
"We went into the pediatrician's office where Dr. Cheryl showed us around. We learned about the importance of 'eating the rainbow' of healthy foods from our dietitian's kitchen, Mrs. Benda. We met the beautiful Great Dane, Waylon, from our veterinarian, Dr. Emily. She gave the 110-pound Waylon a great check-up. We even got to see his big, shiny teeth," Moye added.
"I think it was a really cool idea to put together a virtual career day, and a nice thing that the parents did explaining their jobs," shared Tyler fifth grader Maya Abebe. "Some things that stood out to me was that it can take up to eight years to be a pediatrician, what market researching is, and how to use the tubes for drawing blood."