Chamber officials encourage kids to become career-ready

HOT SPRINGS — Cutter Morning Star students in grades 7-12 learned about the importance of planning for their futures and choosing a career path in a field they will enjoy.

Gary Troutman and Gary Jackson with the Greater Hot Springs Chamber of Commerce and Hot Springs Metro Partnership talked about the array of opportunities available in the Hot Springs area, noting that students do not have to move to Northwest Arkansas, Little Rock or even the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex.

Troutman and Jackson hosted the 45-minute presentation at Eagle Arena on Friday as part of a series they have brought to all seven school districts in Garland County that showcases various local businesses and industry. Troutman, president/CEO of the chamber and metro partnership, said Friday that they were closing in on reaching 3,000 students.

“The driving force behind what we do is 25% of Arkansans, of any age, have four-year degrees,” he said. “We all know how many go to college, but only 25% of the current population actually is graduated with a fouryear degree. So we’re trying to be very cognizant. And the schools have embraced it, that the other 75% — we can’t let them fall through the cracks. We need to find careers for them.”

Troutman said roughly 10,000 baby boomers are retiring every day, which is creating a great void in the workforce. Cutter Morning Star is among several schools in the county to hire a career counselor through National Park College.

“I’m oversimplifying, but in the old days, no matter how old we are, the conversation was, ‘You did great on the ACT, you made a 26, but hey, two more points, I can get you a better scholarship,’” he said. “Or, ‘I’m sorry, you made a 14 on the ACT; here’s some military brochures.’ I mean, that was the extent of career counseling.

“Now people like (Cutter Morning Star career counselor Christi Nation) are having that conversation: ‘Hey did your parents go to school? Do you see a path where you can go to school? Are you particularly good at playing the trombone or shooting a basketball? Is there a scholarship possibility?’ But let’s start with this: ‘What do you want to do?’ Because if it doesn’t pertain to a four-year degree, we need to steer you in another direction.”

He said the main thing he and Jackson are trying to determine is whether the students are ready to go to work when they graduate, if they need to pursue a two-year certification in a skilled trade, for example, or if they need to take the traditional four-year college path.

“We want kids not to be college-ready,” Jackson said. “You hear that all the time and some kids have a stigma about wanting to raise their hand, ‘I’m going to college,’ because they’re embarrassed to say that they don’t want to go to college.”

Rather than being college-ready, the true goal students should be taught to strive for is being career-ready, he said.

“We try to help kids navigate a path in which they choose,” he said. “You’ll hear me tell them, ‘If somebody tells you you have to do this for a living, take two steps back and run and find something that you’re passionate about.’

“That’s what we’re trying to do is introduce a wide swath of industry and opportunities here for possibilities of careers. We don’t say jobs, we say careers.”

Troutman noted that he and Jackson are not trying to talk any student out of the four-year college path but are rather trying to “save the kids and their parents to not be part of the $1.7 trillion student debt deficit that we have.”

He said they are trying to do right by the students while also trying to replace an aging workforce at the same time.

“The message that Gary and I love to talk about … nobody came to (us) in the 10th grade and said, ‘Hey, look, don’t worry about your future,’” Troutman said. “There are plenty of jobs here and no matter what it is that you want to do, there’s somebody older about to retire by the time you can get trained to do what you want to do. There will be a place for you.”

Troutman said roughly 10,000 baby boomers are retiring every day, which is creating a great void in the workforce.