Houston Secondary School is revamping its shop to make way for new trades programs for students and adults.
Superintendent Chris van der Mark says creating new training opportunities is important for communities like Houston.
“I think it is huge and what is really kind of new, at least for us, is the real solid partnerships between the school district, the college and of course we have had some really keen partners and involvement from industry in Houston.”
He says Smithers students will also be able to enroll in the programs at the new shop and will be bused into Houston for classes.
“One of our hurdles in terms of growing industry in the district is we have two (high) schools a little ways away from each other with very different enrollment, very different ability in terms of space and it’s kind of hard to run one program in each location. So what this has helped us do is develop a bit of a vision to treat the district as one school and to figure out what we are going to run where and just get our kids to it.”
Van der Mark says the college and industry are also coordinating programs for adults.
The renovations are currently underway with programs set to start in the fall.