T H E M O N T H LY B U S I N E S S S E C T I O N F O R L I N N A N D B E N T O N C O U N T I E S A N D T H E M I D - W I L L A M E T T E VA L L E Y
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August 2012
Anissa Arthenayake of OSU Federal, pictured in her office near Oregon State University, teaches personal finance skills at schools all over the mid-valley. Amanda Cowan | Mid-Valley InBusiness
Investing in students Businesses share specialized knowledge, skills in schools By JENNIFER ROUSE
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n an ideal world, schools would have the money to fund one-on-one career training for every high school student. They would buy seedlings for every kid in the district, accompanied by lessons from a horticulturist on how to care for them. Work crews would give a fresh coat of paint to every school that needs it, just so things would look nice when school started in the fall. Turns out, all those things and more are happening in mid-valley schools. They’re just not funded by the state. As school budgets fluctuate, mid-valley businesses are filling in the gaps for K-12 education. From helping in the classroom to donating materials to funding special projects, partnerships between schools and businesses are flourishing in the mid-valley, with results that both educators and businesspeople rave about. “Anything you need, they step up,” said Donna Keim, career learning coordinator at Corvallis High School. “Working at career conventions, fundraisers for sports and for theater, and the graduation all-night party. Grants you can apply for. We have a very supportive community.” And the generosity doesn’t stop at writing checks. Some local businesses offer their services in the classroom. Anissa Arthenayake, community educator with OSU Federal Credit Union, teaches personal finance classes at schools throughout the mid-valley. A half-credit of personal finance used to be a part of the required high school curriculum in Oregon, but that requirement was removed by the legislature in 1997. Although personal finance is among the broad array of topics that is supposed to be covered in current social science coursework (other areas include history, civics, geography and economics) there is no specific credit requirement for it. “Some teachers tell me that they feel inadequate to teach it because finance is not their strength,” Arthenayake said. “Or sometimes, I am teaching to students who have already received education in personal finance, but hearing it from a different voice helps it click.” OSU Federal provides Arthenayake’s time as well as classroom handouts for all students, free of charge to any
one does who works in a greenhouse, and most of them really didn’t know anything about it,” said Anna Sokolov, business-to-school liaison for Albany Options School. “The kids got really into it. It was wonderful that Hart’s took the initiative on their own to offer this to us.” It’s providing special activities like that — hands-on experiences that schools might not be able to afford on their own — that make partnerships so beneficial for students. Nancy Kirks has seen it firsthand when she works with students at the Lebanon School District’s “Planting Seeds of Change” community garden. Kirks, the community health improvement partnership coordinator for Samaritan Lebanon Community Hospital, says she’s watched students who were at risk gain in skills and confidence after working in the school gardens. “For kids, it’s so important to get outdoors and experiDavid Patton | Mid-Valley InBusiness ence a classroom without walls,” she said. The Planting Jordyn Taylor-Brown, 9, right, used her brother’s old boots as Seeds of Change project is a collaboration between containers to hold tomato plants and Valerie Brown, 8, plant- Lebanon schools, Samaritan Health, Oregon State Univered hers in a Tootsie Roll container last spring when Hart’s sity’s Master Gardener program, and many other volunNursery came to Periwinkle Elementary School in Albany for a teers. It’s been studied by communities from as far away science lesson on gardening. as Africa as a model for garden partnerships, Kirks said. “When an entire community cares holistically about school that requests it. She said OSU Federal sees this as the child, it makes a difference,” she said. a service toward improving the community’s financial soundness. A day at the fair “The best scenario would be for schools to have a class on Some of the most familiar partnerships for schools are the personal finance,” she said.But since many don’t,Arthenayake ones that focus on career-learning job shadows and apspends her days teaching students about credit scores and prenticeships. Hundreds of businessmen and women help checkbook registers. “This is part of our values,” she said. “It’s an important part of giving back to the community.” out at annual career fairs and assist at mock interviews. “These are real professionals who take time out of their day for this,” Sokolov said.“After the interview, they go through Gardening lessons step by step to talk about the student’s resume,their strengths OSU Federal is not alone in taking its employees’ spe- and weaknesses, even about how they dressed. They might cialized knowledge and offering it to local schools. not believe their teachers, but when they hear someone else This spring, Hart’s Nursery, a wholesale nursery business tell them they wouldn’t get hired if they came to an interview based in Jefferson, offered to send a representative to every dressed that way — then all of a sudden they’re listening.” school in Albany and Jefferson for a science lesson on garBusinesses also fund sports teams and choir trips, prodening. The nursery also donated seedlings and soil so that vide grants and donate items. Churches, community every child could have a hands-on planting activity and take groups and businesses donate expertise and even plain old home a plant of their own. For high school students, they manual labor for mid-valley schools. focused their lesson on horticulture as a career field. “They asked students if they had any idea what someSEE INVESTING | A7