James Foley’s homework comes with horsepower.
And the points he has to support during papers and presentations, more often than not, involve load-bearing walls.
James, a senior at Clay-Battelle Middle/High School and the Monongalia Technical Education Center, is the district’s Student of the Month for January.
He sat down for an interview with Superintendent Eddie Campbell Jr., which can be viewed on the district’s website: https://boe.mono.k12.wv.us/.
“It’s quite an honor, for me, actually, to be able to come here and talk to a student of your caliber,” the superintendent said.
Having completed his required core classes at his high school in Blacksville, James now spends full days at MTEC, toggling back and forth between his automotive tech and carpentry classes.
Call him the DIY king, MTEC’s director Greg Dausch said in his nomination.
He never misses class, the director said.
And, Dausch added, he never fails to act upon his own initiative as a student.
That’s because James is a wrench-turner from way back who also likes building things, as he told the superintendent during their sit-down session at his high school in Blacksville.
“They have the programs I’ve grown up doing, like automotive and carpentry,” he said of his senior days at the tech center on Mississippi Street.
Programs, he said, that make him want to give his all, every day.
“The teachers are really good,” the student said.
“They describe everything how they want it done. How they teach makes it clear and easy.”
So, the superintendent asked, how would James “sell” career technical education to his classmates who may be aware of MTEC but aren’t doing coursework there?
He’d hammer down, he said, on his perspective as a student of the month — who initially didn’t like going to class.
Early on, in fact, he was ready to chuck the whole deal.
Just like the dispatching of broken boards and spent vinyl siding into the Dumpster at the work site.
“I had no desire to go,” he said.
Until MTEC.
“I started coming here and it changed my point of view on going to school,” he said.
“How much it works and how much it will actually help benefit you.”
And, as it turned out, the student who can make engines purr did his own tune-up at Clay-Battelle, after all.
It was smooth cruising, he said, once he gave it a chance and made himself do it.
As with MTEC, Clay-Battelle’s teachers, he said, were the master mechanics for this job.
“They’ve helped me more than I could ever thank them.”
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