Owego, NY (WBNG Binghamton) Got a tech issue in the classroom at Owego-Apalachin schools? No problem.
Some high schoolers take service-learning to a higher level.
It's a program unique to the Owego-Apalachin School District, hiring students to work in the IT department.
"We started out with this program last school year and it rolled into the summer. The intent was to hire on some students to kind of help and augment what we were doing. As far as the IT department goes, we were a little short handed at the time," said Fermin Romero III, Owego-Apalachin IT Department.
The original idea was to hire students with a computer background but it evolved into something more.
"I sort of pushed to say let's see what we can find - students that are super interested in it and also have the aptitude to be able to do the work. Through the hiring process in the beginning of the program, we found six fantastic students. Of the six, five had never even touched a computer before," said Romero III.
Last summer, those six participating students worked on some large-scale projects including re-imaging the district's 500-plus laptops.
This year, four high school students were hired to work in the district's IT department.
After the September 2011 floods, the students got to see how to build a computer network from the ground up at the district's temporary school location at Linnaeus West in Endicott.
The students work during their study hall period. The students troubleshoot IT issues in the classrooms and fix everything from PC's, hard drives, Smartboards and printers.
"I've always wanted to be an engineer so I figured this was a great way to great started in that field," said Nate Skiff, Senior, "It seemed really convenient working at the school and is a great way for me to hold a part-time job."
The district's computer maintenance technicians train the students.
"The first week was pretty stressful for me but now it's just second nature. We've all been trained on how to do it. now we just follow through the steps and just do it," said Skiff.
The students are held to the same standards at the IT department employees.
"Before this job I had little to no experience. I could get on and use a computer. I didn't know the parts or how it worked," said Andrew Piontek, Senior, "Now, I get in and replace stuff and figure out what's wrong with all sorts of things."
"A lot of the teachers are always asking for help. My mom doesn't know computers very well, so I can always help her out with that," said Erik Opie, Senior.
The part-time job helps students flex future career skills and also allows OA's IT department to have more hands on deck.
"It's a huge benefit to me. We are spanned out across 4 buildings, one of them being in Endicott. It makes it so that often times me and my co-workers are off-site," said Romero III,"I can leave this campus now and leave jobs for those students to do, completely un-supervised because their training has progressed so far they are able to accomplish things without me even being here," he continued.
"I have rethought my plans for college and I am now thinking about going into something computer based where I work with machines," said Grant Lindhorst, Sophomore.
"This is definitely something I'm interested in. I'm probably going to take a couple IT classes in college," said Opie.
The students are also developing problem-solving and critical-thinking skills through their training and application of skills.
"I definitely feel I've become a better problem-solver and trouble shooter and it's going to carry on throughout my college career," said Piontek.
Owego-Apalachin says it plans to continue to hire students to work for the district. Romero III says he'd like one day to have enough students to form teams and have students working each period to help out the IT department.
Former O-A student, Keegan Evans, participated in the program and is now studying computer science at Wells College.
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