Exciting career day for Greendale students

"There shouldn't be barriers to (the childrens' dreams)," said Nancy Battet, community and partnership liaison to the Lester B. Pearson school board. She said the school board realized a number of years ago that exposing children to the different career paths available to them before getting to high school would give them a better idea of how necessary the skills they will acquire in secondary education are in any given industry.

"They do a computer survey," she explained, supplied by the federal government. The 40-question survey then tells them what kind of careers they are suited for, according to their interests.

The children then tell their teachers what types of professionals they would like to see on career day.

For Battet, it is also important for the students to realize the range of jobs available in each industry, a point driven home by James Aylsworth, a retired Air Canada pilot who was one of the presenters last Friday.

"You might get a job in what I like to call the airline industry," said Aylsworth, mentioning the industry today includes everything from software engineers for electronic airplane simulators to flight attendants or scientists trying to figure out alternative fuel.

The children listening to Aylsworth's speech seemed shy at first, reticent to ask him questions when prompted to do so. However the timidity faded away rather quickly.

Asked at what age one could get a pilot's license, Aylsworth explained a private license could be obtained as soon as one was 16. "That means you can take your friend flying," he explained. At 18, he added, one could obtain a commercial license. "Now, you can charge him for it," he quipped.

Sixth grade teacher Myriam Boffice told The Chronicke<@$p> one way of getting the children interested about career day was to make them build a historical timeline of inventions and discoveries before the event itself. "Discoveries and inventions are very different," she said, and she hammered the point home with the exercise.

The results could be seen in one of the school's halls, with a colourful cardboard-constructed timeline hanging around all four of its walls.

The event lasted until noon on Friday, with the groups of students rotating between the six different guests.