by Turner Russell

On Career Day, Wednesday, Nov. 19, 97 community guests came into our building to share their expertise.  On that same day, 135 AHS students were reported absent.

AHSneedle Editors present two views of what these numbers say about Career Day and AHS students.

Wednesday’s 135 absent students represented a 900% increase in absences compared to a usual day at AHS, when an average of 15 students are not in attendance. These numbers reflect negative student leadership and show disrespect to the effort that went into offering the day of learning.

On Thursday, students explained their absences from Career Day, many saying the reason they did not attend was because they already knew what career they’re planning on majoring in.

Because so many students felt Career Day was not a significant reason to attend half a day of school, several of the guest speakers were left giving their prepared presentations to classes with only a few students. This likely left speakers feeling unappreciated.

Guest speakers on Career Day were asked to volunteer their time and expertise to help inform Atlantic’s students about future job opportunities. Several of them were actually giving up salary to be present at this event.

In addition to the time donated by presenters, hours of preparation by school-to-work coordinator JoAnn Runyan and the AHS Guidance and Tech Departments were invested in this day. Students often complain that school is boring or fails to connect to the real world. Career Day is a direct response to that complaint, yet students snubbed the event.

Runyan said that the results from past Career Day surveys were “mostly positive.” Furthermore, a number of students made favorable comments about this year’s sessions.

Senior Reid Nichols said he believes “it is rude to not come to listen to the speakers who have taken the time out of their day to come speak with us.  I also know that even though I have a pretty good grasp on what I want to do with my life, I still enjoyed listening to the speakers I had, and learned more about the type of jobs I would like to have later in life.”

Senior Nick Podhajsky asked, “How do the guests feel…about this information?” This is a relevant question because the speakers likely felt their time and effort were not taken seriously when they saw the attendance lists with high numbers of missing students.

Runyan also brought up a good point, suggesting that students who skipped probably did not take into account how many of the speakers (especially the ones from various businesses) have helped support student activities at AHS. Ninety percent of the guests at AHS last Wednesday said they would come again if asked. Our community wants to support students in learning about careers.

Another important factor in the Career Day debate is in which students decided to “be sick.” Senior Rachelle Wagner asked, “Why did NHS members not show up when they are the so-called leaders of the school?” Several other people have asked this same question and felt that the student leaders at AHS should have shown more positive leadership by attending Career Day instead of skipping. It has also been argued that when students take a leadership role (such as NHS or Student Council) they should show more character than other students. Further deepening this issue is the fact that neither administrator was able to be present for the full day.

Every year there are enough sessions offered at Career Day that if upperclassmen don’t want to go to the same sessions they attended two years ago, they could mark different interests on their survey. Doing this, as opposed to skipping, would likely have given them an entirely different experience than they had previously.

Because of the number of missing students at this year’s Career Day, people have wondered if the school will even consider having special events at AHS in the future. Runyan said, “It’s kind of disappointing when students do not seem to be interested in the day.”