Pea Ridge High School

11 PEA RIDGE HIGH SCHOOL | 12.30.2020 LORI ROGERS AGENCY 378 N Curtis Ave. Pea Ridge, AR 72751 lrogers@farmersagent.com Proud member of the Pea Ridge Lions Club www.farmersagent.com/lrogers 479-451-0488 1451 Bella Vista Way • Bella Vista, AR 479-855-3053 • www.throgers.com/bella-vista Mon - FRi 7:30am - 5:00pm • SAt 8:00am - 12:00pm • Closed sun from all of us here at Celebrating This Monumental Occassion and Congratulating All of Our Pea Ridge High School Family 240 Slack Street • Pea Ridge, AR 72751 PEA RIDGE From all your friends at Pioneers in virtual learning broaden the students' experiences beyond Northwest Arkansas. The international organization's mission is to prepare emerging leaders and entrepreneurs in marketing, finance, hospitality and management in high schools and colleges around the globe. "We take our students to the state conference and every year we've qualified for the international conference," Tiauna explained. "They went to Washington DC last year to speak with our legislators and advocate for education. They spoke with Senators John Bozeman and Tom Cotton as well as Congressman Womack. They just sat down with them and had real life conversations with these people about our about our programs." Cathy Segur is the Marketing and Logistics teacher at PRHS. The Marketing and Logistics program is taught to juniors and seniors. The program enables students to see all the different fields that are in the multi- faceted world of business. "There are four classes that I teach in the two-year program," Cathy said. "Year one courses are Retail Management and Supply Chain Management; Year two, Human Resources and Global Marketing. The 'Associates'—what I call the students—learn curriculum provided by Northwest Arkansas Community College and earn concurrent college credit through the community college as well. In addition, I have established business contacts that either come to the classroom to lecture or allow us to tour their facilities. Some of our partners include JB Hunt, Coke, Walmart, Kendal King, BNSF, Outdoor Cap and JUNK, to name a few." Cathy believes the new high school classrooms reflect a "business environment" that gives it a more real world feel. "The reason the program is important is it enables Associates to see all the different ways they could fit into the business world," she explained. "Also, many Associates get a jump on the college credits that they receive in the two years. I love working at Pea Ridge High School. I have full autonomy to run the program as I see best. I love working with my colleagues, but more importantly, working with these young women and men. It has been the most challenging career I have ever done, but very rewarding!" The pathways programs aren't the only way Pea Ridge School District is looking to the future of education. While other school districts around the country were scrambling to incorporate some kind of online learning program when the COVID-19 hit, Pea Ridge was already in the game. "Our virtual concept was established before the pandemic," said Casey Connior, Virtual Program Coordinator for the school district. "We have two different kinds of programs available. One is we allow some of our students the opportunity at the high school take some of their classes online within the high school setting. The other is a fully virtual program." The first virtual learning program was originally set up to allow students to have a little flexibility in their learning. So, if a student, for instance, was working in the field to get their CNA certification before the graduated when they had to go to clinicals two of the five days in a week they wouldn't miss any kind of face-to-face instruction. The fully virtual academy, on the other hand, was designed to address the needs of a different set of students. "We know home schooling has been around for a long time," Casey explained. "And we wanted to have that option available to our Pea Ridge students. We designed our program to assure that those students who need a safe, at-home environment to learn are still under our umbrella. We want to be sure they are talking to teachers, included in the activities so they feel like they are part of the community at the school." There are many reasons a student might need the virtual option. Some students feel safer at home, some have issues socially with being on campus, some have economic concerns. Some have to work through the day to help pay the bills and do their schooling at night. "We just wanted to make sure these kids had an option designed around their situation," Casey said. "In the past, they were left on their own."

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