Auto Technology instructor Jason Cottrille, left, helps students Judith Davis, Brayden Lewis, Jakob Dailey and Logan Peloquin as they make repairs to a truck at the Wood County Technical Center on Thursday. (Photo by Douglass Huxley)

PARKERSBURG — The Wood County Technical Center was recently named one of the top five career technical education (CTE) centers in the state by the West Virginia Department of Education (WVDE).

The Tech Center received the highest accountability scores across all indicators that included participation, concentration, completion, work-based learning, technical assessments and teacher endorsement.

“We’re one of the top five because of our teachers,” said Jason Hughes, director of the Wood County Technical Center and the Caperton Center for Applied Technology. “They care about the kids, they put the extra time in needed for them and it really shows.”

Logan Peloquin, a foreman in the Auto Technology program, would agree with that statement.

“The instructors here are great,” Peloquin said. “I’ve met some instructors that have helped me change and grow as a human and I appreciate that a lot.”

Charles Williams practices the prone handcuffing position on Thomas Delaney during the class in the criminal justice program at the Caperton Center located on the West Virginia University at Parkersburg campus. (Photo by Douglass Huxley)

Peloquin said he has plans to join the Marines and become a diesel technician after graduation and this will give him a leg up once he joins.

“I figured that this is a good way to just familiarize myself with parts of cars that I’m not already familiar with,” he said.

Peloquin, who started in the carpentry program before switching over to automotive technology, credits the hands-on experience he’s receiving for the success he’s found at the Tech Center. He said in a traditional classroom he might be a B or C student but at the Tech Center he is getting straight A’s.

“Some people learn the traditional way in a book. Some people can’t. I can’t,” he said. “I think that a good, healthy environment to learn, is the reason that kids show up and want to be here and do their best work.”

Two students in the options program, which allows students to catch up on traditional work while also taking program classes, said coming to the Tech Center has changed their outlook on learning.

Emergency and Fire Management Instructor Tom Werry, left, demonstrates how to safely secure a victim during an accident at the Caperton Center located on the West Virginia University at Parkersburg campus. (Photo by Douglass Huxley)

“My attendance last year was terrible. You couldn’t catch me going to school for a whole week,” senior Raeann Countrymen, who is in the allied health/medical assisting program, said. “This year, I have a whole different mindset. You would have never caught me studying last year, the year before, the year before that. But I literally study every single night now, because we have a test in my medical class every Thursday on medical terminology.”

Fellow senior Kailen Griffin, who is in the newly established advanced manufacturing program, said she also had trouble being in class every day.

“I used to skip school a lot, but now I show up every day,” Griffin said. “It’s a lot easier when I’m focused.”

Rod Marks, who is in his first year as the instructor for the advanced manufacturing program, said one of the signs he sees that his students are eager to learn is how they behave while not in class.

“The kids come in here, and they come to my class early because they’d rather hang out here than in the lunchroom with a crowd of people,” Marks said. “They just feel that they’re at home here.”

Becky Marks, who is Marks’ wife and the ProStart restaurant management instructor, said students at the Tech Center also learn some much needed life skills while attending class.

“There’s a definite need for the soft skills, work ethic kinds of things for the students,” she said. “Here at the Tech Center, we hit on resumes, job applications, interview skills, work ethic, teamwork, problem solving. So that’s a huge thing that the students don’t get in a normal classroom.”

Jasmine Richards, the allied health/medical assisting program instructor, said her students are also learning things they wouldn’t in a traditional classroom.

“I do a lot of mock scenarios in my classroom and we’ll run fake clinic days where they learn those communication skills that maybe they wouldn’t learn in a classroom,” Richards said. “Communicating with patients is a big part of my field.”

All three students said they are learning these skills that they can take into the workforce with them after they leave the Tech Center.

“You can use this for the rest of your life, no matter if you go into the career…or not,” Peloquin said. “You don’t have to pay someone to change your oil or change your brakes, and if you do, you know you’re not getting ripped off.”

Countrymen said she will be able to hit the ground running after she graduates.

“I’m gonna graduate, and I’m gonna have a certification when I graduate,” she said. “Some of the kids out of the (allied health/medical assisting program) are already working, and making good money.”

Peloquin encouraged any student who is thinking about joining one of the programs to make the decision to do so.

“Do it,” he said. “There’s nothing you can’t lose from it. You get certifications that are free, and if you do them outside…you have to pay for it.”

A link to the full list of programs offered at the Wood County Technical Center and the Caperton Center for Applied Technology can be found in the online version of this story.