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The look in his eyes said it best as the obviously frustrated teacher flailed his arms and pointed at a dissembled fork and handle bars lying on the ground. A wheel spun uselessly on the floor at his feet.
“…If you would just put the thingy into the doodad, and screw the thing-a-ma-bobber into the what-you-ma-call-it, we’d be done already...”
Across the room, similar scenarios were unfolding as a room of highly-intelligent educators was reduced to an aggravated, irritated mess as they struggled to build a bicycle together — in silence.
Now while it may seem like torture, it really was an exercise in communication, albeit in its basest sense. The educators were training to become better communicators so they could teach their students valuable skills like teamwork and cooperation.
Welcome to the PASS program.
The program, Partners Advancing Student Success (PASS) is a partnership between APS, Motorola and Communities in Schools created to bring business and education together and give students the skills they need to succeed in today’s business world. It is a public, private, nonprofit partnership aimed at teaching educators and students learning the business skills they need to contribute immediately in a workplace that changes daily.
“The bicycle building exercise is just one way we get educators to look at things differently,” said APS Community Relations Representative Louise Moskowitz. “The PASS program trains teachers to work with concepts that are outside of their areas of expertise, such as math and social studies. If they can teach their kids to be better team players and problem solvers, they are just setting their students up to be better employees in tomorrow’s workplace.”
In its sixth year, PASS is designed to bring business and education together and give students the skills they need to succeed in today’s business world. PASS addresses areas that teachers normal don’t have slated into their core curriculums such as dressing for success, learning to be punctual, critical thinking and working in teams.
Basically PASS helps teachers helps students see the relevance in the subjects they are learning and how those skills are important in the business world and beyond,” said Moskowitz, who also is involved with the company’s other education-based programs.
APS became involved in the PASS program two years ago to ensure that students develop the skills set forth by the Arizona Academic Workplace Skills Standards. According to Moskowitz, the PASS program has been a success in connecting these standards and school curriculums. The goal is to take PASS statewide.
“Although the program is only two years old,” says Moskowitz, “reviews have been outstanding. The PASS program brings together business partners, administrators, teachers and members of the community. One of the major goals of the program is to increase awareness. Not only do we need to teach our students, we need to educate our instructors so they can turn around and teach the students. Teachers are creating action plans based on the PASS program. The feedback has been overwhelmingly positive.”
Moskowitz gave the example of a kindergarten teacher who changed the configuration of his classroom to reflect business cubicles. The teacher even gave the children clip boards which they used to keep important information together. As a result, Moskowitz said the children were more attentive and responsible for their things.
Another teacher took the teamwork lessons he learned through PASS into his high school, where students were made responsible for each other.
“If one student failed, they all failed,” said Moskowitz, who relayed the anecdote while shuffling through hundreds of thank you cards from teachers across the state. “The students really learned to care for one another and learned to work together. It was an awesome example of these lessons being put to use in everyday life.”
With PASS students are not the only program beneficiaries. Teachers and other educators increase their business awareness and add new skills that increase their business worth as well. And business leaders save time and money by selecting from candidates who already possess many of the skills they need to contribute. Communities are strengthened by a better business climate.
“We are trying to help build tomorrow’s business leaders,” said Moskowitz. “If we can reach students now, we can teach them the attributes they will need for tomorrow. We can help them to improve test scores, decrease absenteeism and just encourage leadership, responsibility and a work ethic.”
Moskowitz’ counterpart at Motorola agrees.
“I always say; if we only have one nickel to spend in the community, let’s spend it on teachers,” said Barbara Clark of Motorola’s Arizona Community Relations and Education department. “We are really helping teachers make a connection with their students. APS is a wonderful partner for us because we are two companies of a like heart when it comes to education and teachers. Our partnership with APS is even more powerful because APS is statewide and Motorola is not. APS can help take the program to places Motorola maybe can’t.”
So far, more than 14,000 students, grades K through 12, have been affected by the lessons taught in PASS. By integrating the workplace skills they need for the future into their education today, APS and the Partners Advancing Student Success program look to ensure that students can keep up with the business world by involving them now.
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