The CTAE Connector

February was a great CTE Month in Pasco County! Be sure to check our Facebook page and the video highlighting the visits our team, the Superintendent's staff, and the School Board made to schools throughout the county.

As we wrap up the third quarter, the CTAE Team is busy with several key initiatives, including:

• Leading Early Release Day Professional Development for CTAE teachers

• Preparing budget requests for the 2022-2023 school year

• Completing program evaluations

• Supporting industry certification testing

• Completing our Comprehensive Local Needs Assessment

• Hosting the Creative Confections Dessert Competition

• Coordinating the Pasco Young Entrepreneurs Competition

• Collaborating with schools to align 2022-2023 program and course offerings

• Supporting Pasco Pathways school choice options

We are so proud of the innovative career, technical and adult education opportunities throughout Pasco County and look forward to seeing even more student success during the fourth quarter.

As always, we are "Preparing Today for Tomorrow's Workforce" and we appreciate your support of our students and schools!

Please feel free to contact us at 813-794-2204, join us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter @PascoCTE!

Stay safe, keep it simple and be well,

Lori Romano, Ph.D.

Director, Office of Career, Technical and Adult Education

The Office of Leading and Learning would love to hear from you about ways to strengthen our grading practices work in Pasco County Schools.

We are currently planning to facilitate focus groups via Zoom the last two weeks in March. These focus groups will include 6-8 participants in each and will last approximately 45-60 minutes with options to participate either before or after school.

We are seeking individuals with the following characteristics:

• See the benefits of standards-based grading practices and how it impacts student achievement

• Have implemented standards-based strategies independently and/or with PLCs

• Open to discussing concerns and strategies to strengthen standards-based grading practices

New teachers and veteran teachers

• Teach at the middle and high school levels

If you are interested, please click on this link to provide us some initial information. Although, we are seeking as many teachers as possible to participate, it is important to note that everyone who desires to participate may not be selected. If selected, you will hear from us via email the week of March 7th. Focus groups dates and times will be shared at that time. We look forward to hearing from you!

Please contact, Melissa Caruso, at mlcaruso@pasco.k12.fl.us, if you have any questions or concerns.

Marchman Technical College recently held their annual "Tech Connect" event. Over 300 students from 19 high schools visited the campus to learn about CTE career pathways available to them after graduation. Students interested in learning more were invited back to the Sneak Peek open house scheduled for Thursday, March 3rd from 5:30 to 7:30.

- Submitted by Kim Dunn

Congratulations to the Zephyrhills High School Bulldog Battalion for their achievements at the February 6th JROTC competition at University of Tampa! They competed against 32 other schools in 16 different events and brought home trophies for the following:

• First place male platoon exhibition

• Third place female platoon exhibition

• Third place female armed squad

• Third place male squad exhibition

In addition to these accomplishments, these individual cadets earned honors:

Cadet/ LTC Zac Arnold, the Battalion Commander for the Bulldog Battalion received a four-year National Army ROTC Scholarship. He's been accepted into Virginia Military Institute and The Citadel.

Cadet Major Jimmy L. McAuley, III, the Battalion XO and captain of the varsity basketball team, helped Zephyrhills High School win the District 5a 6 Championship.

The Zephyrhills Rifle rifle team took first place in Area Nine Rifle team competition, beating Sickles High by one point! Cadet Chloe Price was the top overall shooter.

- Submitted by JROTC Leader Jimmy McAuley

• Please share information about your program that you would like considered for the CTE monthly newsletter (photos, awards, events, certifications, etc.).

• Don't forget that you can email Pam Willoughby (pwilloug@pasco.k12.fl.us) with news and photos you want posted on our social media platforms at any time throughout the month.

Teacher Stephanie Parry coordinated a classroom presentation of equine chiropractic and acupuncture treatment. Kaitlyn Solberg is one of the students whose horse benefitted from this learning experience.

- Submitted by Mignon Edwards, Career Specialist

Thank you, Pasco Education Foundation, for supporting our soft skills learning! With new rechargeable batteries for our STEM centers, pinwheels, wiki sticks and sensory balls, the Business Wildcats are exploring teamwork with calming stations to improve our cognitive reasoning and coping skills.

Please also follow us on our twitter to see exciting STEM meets SEL moments like the Mentos and Diet Coke experiment!

@BusinessWildca1

- Submitted by Jenna Eyers

Gulf High School Early Childhood Education students volunteer twice per week (during their ECE class period) at Marlowe Elementary School. The ECE students visit the same Pre-K and Kindergarten classes every week in order to provide consistency to the young children.

- Submitted by Kari Dittman

Shout out to 30 future health professionals from Wiregrass Ranch High School, who finished their CNA clinicals while assisting the residents of Balomero Lopez State Veterans Home in Land O' Lakes! Pictured are the last group of ten with Jennifer Wilson, who hosting the students, and CTAE Program Specialist Dr. Lynn Deitrick.

They have just completed our applications for Prometric to take the Certification exam for Nursing Assistant.

- Submitted by Lisa Fiske

Students in the Land O' Lakes High School Academy of Culinary Arts recently harvested vegetables, fruits and herbs grown on campus. They've been using these ingredients in the dishes they cook and serve daily in the Lakeview Cafe. Chefs Jessica Cooper and Jeremy Blythe are leading the farm-to-table learning activities for their students.

Cypress Creek Middle School’s “Coding Fundamentals II” classes just finished a unit on HTML coding. HTML (Hyper Text Markup Language) is the coding language used to build webpages. Students began the unit by creating their own logo and business card. They then created their own Converse Sneakers, using an image of something they love.

Students next created two web pages of two things that are important to them, examples included: music, dogs, soccer, sports teams, ballet, and cars. Students completed the HTML lesson by creating a master webpage that included their business card, Converse Sneakers, and three images of things that they love with links to their other webpages.

Here is a video of some of the students webpages:

https://youtu.be/X05Vy2dI1GU

- Submitted by Stephanie Steffens

Saturday, February 26th, was a gorgeous day for the WCHS Auto Show! A record 89 vehicles entered the competition and the community showed their support. Thank you to Mr. Corliss and Mr. Odell for hosting the event. Business partners AmSkills, Inc. and Goodyear were there to help, as well as several food trucks and a deejay. A beautiful, baby blue, 1961 Impala won the Grand Champion award. All trophies were created by students in the WCHS Academy of Automotive Technology.

Adult ESOL students challenged themselves by teaching their classmates different feeling adjectives with innovative Powerpoint presentations. Students paired up to review for their first test by teaching specific concepts (verb tenses, family, feeling words). I must say that I saw some future educators in the group! The following students scored 100+ on the first test: Mara Santos, Shaza Al-Aswad, Fabiola Suarez, Sullybeth Crespo, Adriana Bello, Ximena Millan, Arly Lago, and Elena Torres. Congratulations!

Students showed off their creative side with special Valentine's cards that shared positive adjectives about each other.

Ingrid Costa was presented with the January Award of Excellence from Marchman Technical College. Congratulations, Ingrid - this is a well-deserved honor!

- Submitted by Rebecca Sandy

Email: lmromano@pasco.k12.fl.us
Website: http://www.pasco.k12.fl.us/cte/
Location: 7227 Land O' Lakes Boulevard, Land O Lakes, FL, USA
Phone: 813-794-2011
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pascoschools/
Twitter: @PascoCTE