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HCSR to Celebrate 10th Anniversary! |
Business and
Community Events
April 17, 2012:
HCSR Tenth Anniversary
Annual Meeting
SAT Dates for 2012:
Mar 10, May
5, Jun 2
ACT Dates for 2012:
April 14, Jun
9
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The HCSR Mission Statement
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Hanover Career Student
Resource, Inc. (HCSR) is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit group
organized for the purpose of promoting career opportunities
for high school students and graduates in Hanover County.
Federal ID # 51-0415089
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Are you missing that high
school diploma you need to find a job or advance in your
present career? Click here for information on obtaining a
GED diploma. Call the Georgetown School at 723-3460.
Check out the Hanover
Education Foundation at
www.hefhanover.com.
*****
The Career Guide is an effective way to communicate
training, apprenticeships and other educational
opportunities to a large audience of prospective employees.
Click here to check out the HSCR Guide Review
HINT: Volunteer! You’ll add skills, make
contacts, and it can lead to a job.
www.hanovervolunteers.org
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HCSR
will celebrate their 10th
Anniversary at their Annual Meeting on Tuesday, April 17 from 11: 00 AM to 1:00 PM at The
Hanover Center for Trades and Technology. The guest speaker
will be Secretary of Commerce and Trade,
Jim Cheng.
A buffet lunch will be provided. To
reserve a seat, please email
Margaret Hill. The
Official Invitation
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Career guide connects
students to local business
By DAN SHERRIER
Herald-Progress Staff
Writer
Published
February 16, 2012
.jpg) High school students seeking local employment
have a fairly comprehensive resource, thanks to the
efforts of a volunteer group.
Hanover Career Student
Resource, Inc. (HCSR) publishes a career guide and
maintains an online database of participating
Hanover-area employers.
Employers list their contact
information, a contact name, the primary focus of the
business, types of jobs typically available, workplace
learning opportunities, and opportunities for training.
Whether they’re seeking internships, part-time jobs or
trying to get a start on a career, students can browse
the listings and inquire to local businesses that appear
to match their interests.
The nonprofit HCSR formed 10
years ago with the goal of facilitating communication
between students and local businesses, but the concept
had been in the works for years even before then.
It
began with the Hanover Industrial Air Park Business
Association’s education committee, according to founding
member and current chairman of the board, Marylou Paine.
The education committee formed a partnership with
Hanover County Public Schools and implemented a database
of Air Park businesses for students to search for jobs.
There were two main problems with that approach. For
one, limiting it to the Air Park kept the scope too
small.
Even more problematic was the year. It was 1995.
Technology still had to catch up to the idea for it to
become useful to a larger number of students.
The
volunteers didn’t give up, though. From 1995 through
2002, they kept trying to make something work. They
sought grants from regional organizations, but nothing
quite seemed to work out.
They hit a turning point in
1999, when the school system hired career counselors for
the high schools.
“The people in the school system had
students that wanted somewhere to go. They wanted to
know about career opportunities. They [career
counselors] had a job that they needed to expand,” Paine
said.
“It was the best connection that the business
community had had in the school system since year one,”
she added.
One of those career counselors was Celeste
Hall, who recently retired but remains a board member
for HCSR.
“From the point of view of a career counselor,
if you’re pulling together all sorts of resources for
job shadowing, for career fairs and career speakers, or
part-time jobs, co-op jobs—if some entity is out there
doing that work and pulling together a resource, I
certainly want to be a part of that, because I want to
see that happen,” Hall said.
She continued, “It made a
lot of sense for the career counselors to get on board
with HCSR, because we had the same objectives in terms
of helping the students.”
Paine said, “The career
counselors had a lot of input into the type of
information we needed to collect.”
“The point of it was
to provide opportunities for students and to grow the
workforce, kind of to help both sides,” Hall said.
HCSR
was established as a nonprofit in 2002, and $15,000
grant the Va. Department of Business Assistance allowed
the first career guide to be published in 2004.
The most
recent career guide came out in 2007, but the
corresponding online guide is updated regularly at
www.hanovercareers.org.
Both the physical book and the
website contain a wealth of useful information for job
seekers. Even adults might find helpful refreshers and
leads.
In addition to the employer listings, students
can find interview tips, sample resumes, Virginia child
labor laws, sample telephone scripts, and more.
HCSR has
also published similar tips in a magazine format as the
HCSR Guide Review. The most recent edition is dated
2011, and the magazines are available for viewing on the
website.
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The website is free to use. Counselors
distribute the guides to high school students, also at
no charge.
“All four of the high schools in Hanover
County are given enough copies to give every 10th, 11th,
and 12th grader a copy of that book,” HCSR president
Kyle Aylor said.
HCSR does not charge businesses to list
their information, and participation is voluntary. There
is an additional option for paid advertising, which
helps offset printing costs.
HCSR recognizes that the
four-year college path isn’t for everyone. The guide is
meant to serve all students, whether they’re planning on
going straight to college, straight into the workforce,
or just want to explore some options.
“There are a lot
of people for whom maybe that direct-to-college pathway
isn’t the right thing for them, but they don’t know what
else to do,” Hall said.
“So how do you find those other
things? You pretty much have to find them by part-time
employment, talking to people, networking, doing a job
shadow, asking people, ‘Hey, if I want to be an
automotive technician, how do I do that?’” she
continued.
One success story highlighted in HCSR’s 2009
magazine is Atlee High School alumnus Drew Palmer.
Palmer had been taking automotive classes at Hanover
High School and was searching for local businesses in
the automotive industry.
In the career guide, he found
Duffy’s Auto Repair and called owner Billy Duffy, who
did not have an opening at the time. But Palmer
impressed him, so Duffy found some work for him to do to
give the young man a shot.
Palmer rose through the
ranks, and he is still there today, functioning as
Duffy’s right-hand-man.
“It was very helpful,” Palmer
said of the guide. “It basically gave me a direction,
whereas otherwise I would’ve been lost.”
HCSR has
attracted the attention of Jim Cheng, the Va. Secretary
of Commerce and Trade, who is scheduled to speak at
HCSR’s annual meeting April 17 at the Hanover Center for
Trades & Technology.
The free event will include
catering by Hanover Center culinary arts students, and
it is intended essentially as a “thank you” to HSCR’s
supporters on its 10th anniversary. Businesses with a
profile in the guide will be sent an invitation.
“We are very excited about Secretary Cheng being our speaker,”
Hall said.
The HCSR career guide is an uncommon
publication, if not altogether unique. Hall, in her
professional experience as a nationally certified career
counselor, has encountered career guides aimed at
college students but no free guides focused on the high
school level.
“The idea of businesses and education
working together is very important, because business
informs education, and education helps to have the kind
of workforce that businesses need to function,” Hall
added.
For more information about Hanover Career Student
Resource, Inc., go online to www.hanovercareers.org.
Viewing the business directory requires free
registration.
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