Students in grades 5 to 10 had some hands-on experience with jobs in demand in B.C. when the Find Your Fit Tour came to Elphinstone Secondary School on Jan. 10.
The Find Your Fit Tour is put on by WorkBC and it seeks to help students discover a range of in-demand careers across the province and what needs to be done to break into them.
The tour boasts up to 16 career activity stations where students can take part in activities related to specific careers that are expected to grow in the future.
For example, the carpentry station timed students on how fast they could work through a series of carpentry-related skills while the electrician station had students try their hand at connecting circuits.
Stations set up in the school’s gym ranged from jobs in the LNG sector to those in healthcare, and everything in between.
Grade 9 Elphinstone student Gavin Lynagh said he found the event beneficial. “I like that it’s interactive. I feel like you learn more about it when you’re doing it instead of just reading about it,” he said.
He didn’t walk away knowing exactly what his career path would be in the future but said he was drawn to the truck driver station that tested him on the four main skills he would need to become a professional driver.
Grade 9 student Crystelle Arellano left the tour having a slightly clearer picture of her future career path. “I really found an interest in nurses and nurse aides,” Crystelle said.
“I found it really interesting and I liked the little things I learned. Now I feel like I want to go into the medical field.”
Fellow Grade 9 student Alyssa Beaubien said she found a few possible career paths at the event. “I think I want to become an early childhood educator, but I also found the carpentry thing cool, and the medical thing was cool too,” she said. “It just helped me get more information on everything.”
Most students don’t leave the Find Your Fit Tour knowing exactly what they’ll do in the future for work, but it opens their minds to a variety of possibilities in fields that should still be hiring when they graduate.
Elphinstone Secondary School vice principal Drew Murphy said opening the minds of students is the main focus of the event.
“I think sometimes kids get apprehensive talking about jobs because they feel they’re going to be pigeon-holed, and that’s not the idea,” Murphy said.
“This gets away from that and says it’s an exploration process and it’s an ongoing process.”
He also noted that the online job resources being accessed by students at the event were the same resources anyone can access at home. “So they’re touching on resources they can go home and use. In that regard it’s really, really valuable,” Murphy said.
During the all-day event, Grade 9 and 10 students from Elphinstone circulated through the stations as well as invited grades 5, 6 and 7 students from elementary schools on the Coast. From 3:15 to 7 p.m., the event was open for students of any age and their parents to take part.
Gibsons was the second stop this month on the Find Your Fit Tour that will also visit Courtenay, Port Hardy, Port Alberni, Nanaimo and Victoria before February.
Any school can request a Find Your Fit Tour through the WorkBC website at www.workbc.ca/Jobs-Careers/Find-Your-Fit-Tour.aspx
