For five years, volunteers from Graybar have taken time to spend a day at Armstrong Elementary School in the Hazelwood School District to work in classrooms and lead activities and lessons through Junior Achievement in a Day.
Junior Achievement (JA) is an organization “dedicated to educating students about entrepreneurship, work readiness, and financial literacy through experiential, hands-on programs.” Volunteers lead students in engaging activities, serve as role models and enrich the activities with their own life experiences.
Through JA in a Day, students work on themed kits by grade level: “Ourselves” for kindergartners; “Our Families” for first-graders; “Our Community” for second-grade students; “Our City” for third grade; “Our Region” for fourth grade; and “Our Nation” for fifth-grade students.
Recently, 40 volunteers from Graybar worked in pairs or small groups from 9:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. The volunteers were easy to spot as the women wore charcoal grey cardigans and the men wore grey button-down shirts. In classrooms throughout the school, the energy in the classrooms was enthusiastic.
For example, in Kevin Keppel’s third-grade class, students worked on creating a newspaper by researching the parts of a newspaper, and writing articles on school news, entertainment or business. On the whiteboard, the Five Ws of a newspaper reminded them of key questions – who, what, when, where and why. The students were asking questions, taking notes, working with the JA kits and interacting with the volunteers.
Next door in Tammy Roberts’ third-grade class, students were learning about different areas of cities. They created buildings to add to a large city map that was spread out on the floor in the back of the classroom.
To celebrate the partnership, Jon Reed, vice president and treasurer of Graybar, presented a plaque and two presentation projectors valued at $2,000 to the school. Lori Jacob, president and CEO of Junior Achievement of Greater St. Louis, attended the ceremony.
Dr. Amy Dittmar, principal, and Tara Schillhahn, guidance counselor, accepted the gifts on behalf of the school.
“These projectors are crucial to integrating technology in our classrooms,” said Schillhahn, addressing the volunteers and Armstrong staff.
“With these projectors, our teachers will be able to project assignments and activities on a screen, we can enhance student engagement, and we can use them as tools for professional development,” said Dittmar.
“We appreciate the partnership with Graybar and your commitment to our school. Our kids and teachers love it. Thank you,” continued Dittmar.
The connection between Armstrong Elementary School, Graybar and Junior Achievement is a reflection of the HSD value of forming partnerships with parents and community members to ensure the success of each student.