Co-op experience a valuable one

With Fort High students in the final week of the first semester, a number of them are preparing to leave their co-op placements and return to the regular classroom for the rest of the year.
The co-op program, offered to students in grade 11 and older, allows students to gain an education in a workplace rather than in the classroom for any in-school subject.
When making their course selections for the coming year, students also can apply for co-op. They must get signatures from two teachers who believe they’re responsible enough to undertake the job. The students also list three businesses they’d like to do their co-op at.
If their co-op is accepted, and everything can be arranged, then it’s put into the student’s schedule.
After a week or so of in-class preparations, students spend half of every school day at their co-op placement. They are assigned to a supervisor, who becomes their boss for the span of the placement, and the student gets to learn about a possible career or future job.
Every month or so, one in-class day is scheduled to have assignments returned and to go over any concerns about the placement students might have.
Over the 19-week semester, co-op students have to amass 220 hours at their placement, as well as complete weekly log sheets and assignments, a career portfolio, and a display about their co-op.
Co-op students have been working in several placements around the district, including Abitibi-Consolidated, La Verendrye hospital, Gagne Pharmacy, the Fort Frances Dental Centre, the police station, the fire hall, a number of elementary schools in Fort Frances, and, of course, here at the Fort Frances Times.
In Emo, placements include Donald Young School, Ken’s Central Service, Canning Lane Veterinary Hospital, and the research station.
The experience has been a rewarding one for most of the students.
“It’s helped me decide that this is what I really want to do,” said Erin McIvor, who has been doing a physiotherapy placement at La Verendrye hospital.
“I got to do a lot of work with people who suffered strokes and I have really learned a lot in the time I have been here,” she added.
“It’s been a really good experience,” echoed Nicole Murray, who has worked as a pharmacist at Gagne Pharmacy. “I’ve learned a lot more at co-op than I ever would have in a classroom this year.”
One very popular choice for a co-op placement is at elementary schools around the district.
“This semester has just been great,” enthused Dawn Pruys, who did her co-op in a grade four/five class at Robert Moore School. “I’ve learned so much and now I have no doubts as to what I want to do.”
“It’s a valuable experience,” agreed co-op monitor Marnie Cumming. “It’s a great tool to help students decide on a career, or even decide against one.”
“It’s just as valuable to have a student, say, decide against pursuing a certain career because of their co-op experience,” noted monitor Nancy Gillon.
“It’s also interesting to note that many of the supervisors we have now were at one time co-op students themselves,” said Cumming. “It sort of makes the co-op circle complete.”
Fort High was the first school in Ontario to offer co-op when the program started back in 1970 with 10 students and 10 businesses participating. Now 30 years later, it has grown from those 10 students to more than 60,000 a year throughout the province.
Although a co-op placement now is very different than it was 30 years ago, the objective remains the same.
The Co-operative Education Program is designed to allow students to gain practical experience in an on-the-job situation, and to help prepare them to pursue it as a career.