Area students attend career conference at WNCC

Approximately 190 students from Sidney, Layton, Bridgeport, Potter-Dix, Creek Valley, South Platte and Garden County High Schools attended the Southern Panhandle Sophomore Career Conference on March 22.

Western Nebraska Community College (WNCC) has hosted this conference for many years, according to Tricia England, the student services coordinator, “since the WNCC location was at the old Army depot.”

England added that the career conference is a partnership between WNCC, ESU 13 and the Cheyenne County Chamber of Commerce and they rely on input from the high school counselors and principals to get an idea of what students want to see at the conference.

After check-in, students started their day with a “homeroom” informative session. Students were able to choose which presentations that they wanted to attend in various career fields. The volunteer presenters were from career fields such as cosmetology, law enforcement, visual arts, nursing, taxidermy, computer technology, agriculture and the Armed Forces.

There were three two-part sessions with eight different informative presentations in each session. Students had the option of taking bus tours which ran concurrently with the sessions that took students for informative tours of local businesses which included Sidney Veterinary Hospital, Sandpoint Cattle Company, T.E. Connectivity and Gehrig-Stitt Funeral Home, amongst others.

The visual arts presentation was made by Janell Wicht, who brought in a few of her paintings and encouraged students to think of five to seven things that they may be good at doing, including art. When Wicht asked students what type of art they want to do, one boy replied “Animation,” while a girl said that she wasn’t sure, but that when she attends art class, she just does “something.”

Cindy Bartling made the presentation about theatrical make-up. Eric, a make-up artist from Paper Dolls transformed flawless-skinned model named Deb into a car crash victim using make-up techniques. Bartling stressed the importance of networking in today’s society, and she gave tips about make-up artist books, makeup, brushes and markets.