WICHITA, Kan. (KSNW) – The Wichita Public School District is offering an open house for both locations of its Future Readiness Center.
These centers aim to provide hands-on training, learning opportunities and mentoring from industry experts. This open house is intended to show parents and students what is offered at the two Wichita facilities.
All Wichita students, regardless of what high school they attend, can attend Future Ready Centers. They will divide their time between these sites and their primary school.
The facility is located at 3821 E. Harry St. It focuses on health care training, while the other building at 1435 N. Waco Ave. On manufacturing. The Manufacturing program is primarily aimed at juniors and seniors and recently opened the program to sophomores in their second semester.
The program currently has about 100 students, with another 100 students already registered for the fall semester. The Career and Technical Education (CTE) lead teacher says she hopes more parents and students will come to check out the facility during the open house and that she would like to double the number of students in the program.
“Recruitment is huge, but retention is just as important because once they get here, we want them to stay. We want them to like it as much as we do, and we want them to stay,” said Tammy Kuipers, $259 CTE coach.
Students earn college credit from WSU Tech which they can also transfer to other universities. They can also graduate with certificates or associate degrees with sufficient credits. A few students from the full-time manufacturing program have already been placed at different technology companies since graduating from high school.
“A lot of people take advantage of the opportunity this program provides students, there are a lot of great companies looking for young teenage students to work for them,” North High School student Jovani Rios said.
The open house continues through Friday at both Future Ready centers.
