Career Day students take on DailyTrib.com and KBEY jobs
Marble Falls High School juniors Marshall Henderson (left), Jalen Rogiers, and T.J. Garcia, and Falls Career High School junior Sherri Fitzpatrick talked with KBEY 103.9 FM Radio Picayune Operations Manager Ben Shields live on the air Jan. 25 while DailyTrib.com reporters Nathan Bush and Dakota Morrissiey (taking photos) observed. The students took part in the Marble Falls Rotary Club's annual Career Day. Staff photo by Suzanne Freeman
Career Day at Victory Media began in the KBEY 103.9 FM Radio Picayune studio, where four juniors from Marble Falls and Falls Career high schools talked about why they chose to explore communications.
“I came out here to learn how to do media marketing, like e-commerce,” MFHS student Marshall Henderson told KBEY Operations Manager Ben Shields during a live interview on Thursday, Jan. 25. “I’m looking for how to open the door and learn how to get products on the market and get more clicks on my sites.”
T.J. Garcia and Jalen Rogiers, both 11th-graders at MFHS, said they were content creators/streamers who wanted to increase their number of viewers. They stream digital games.
“I want to push it to another level to eventually get paid for it,” Rogiers said.
Falls Career junior Sherri Fitzpatrick said she had no agenda beyond “looking around to see what’s available,” which is the purpose behind the annual career program hosted by the Marble Falls Rotary Club for juniors in the Marble Falls school district and at Faith Academy of Marble Falls.
“The reason we do this is because one of Rotary’s areas of service is vocational service,” said Ellison Crider, who organizes Career Day with wife Faye. “We want to expose junior students to various vocations that are available in the community, to expose them to the opportunities that are out there. This is a way to learn what an occupation’s tasks and duties are.”
Students choose from a list of about 20 occupations, including dentistry, science, engineering, firefighting, military, and media marketing.
At Victory Media, surprise guest Bonnie Baskin, a microbiologist and founder of the Science Mill in Johnson City, talked to the four juniors about the importance of good communication in any profession.
“You have to be able to tell the story and tell it in a logical way, following a train of thought,” she said. “A lot of people are really smart, and then they write something and you can’t figure it out. When I was hiring, it was important to me to see how well applicants communicated, starting with their introductory letter.”
Learning to tell a story began immediately after Baskin’s remarks. Students held an editorial meeting with DailyTrib.com staff writers Nathan Bush and Dakota Morrissiey to map out the day’s assignments. They researched their subjects and came up with a list of questions before heading to downtown Marble Falls.
Fitzpatrick and Henderson were sent to Old Oak Square with Bush to interview owner and real estate lessor Mitch McManus. Rogiers and Garcia visited House of Cheese to learn about the small business from owners Savannah Gonzalez and Meritt Coughran.
Students split duties between taking notes and photos, bringing it all back to the Victory Media office to write up.
Read the stories here:
The day ended with students delivering KBEY news reports on air.
“They were all really excited about the day,” said Rotary member Kathy Kasparik Nicholl. She was one of about 50 Rotary volunteers who participated in either opening their offices or driving students to their assignments. “One of them interviewed a real estate broker and developer for a story and said he wanted to explore doing that in the future. You never know what they are going to learn on Career Day.”