Calgary student Irfanali Moledina is heading to university this fall with his eye on a degree in business accounting.

But the James Fowler High School grad is getting an early start on his post- secondary education this summer – and a potential leg up on a promising career – through a unique work-experience program that is a cornerstone of an experimental new approach to delivering curriculum to Calgary high school students.

Alberta’s largest school board, Alberta Learning and Junior Achievement have teamed up to create a new multi-year “career pathways” program that will allow high school students to incorporate business and finance studies, as well as other work-related disciplines, into their full-time academic classes.

The Calgary Board of Education’s (CBE) career pathway approach, believed to be a first in Canada, is patterned after a similar project in Vancouver, Wash. But unlike the U.S. program, it plans to go beyond simply offering career-related courses in favour of a fully integrated path of study and a related summer work option.

Shannon Oatway photo, Business Edge
He’s just out of high school, but 18-year-old Irfanali Moledina has his sights set on a career in business.

“It’s a huge mindshift” from a traditional approach, says Debbie Vance, a career pathways co-ordinator with the CBE. “What we’ve found when we work with our industry and business partners is that they want to support us. They want us to be the curriculum experts, but they want the opportunity to say: ‘This is what we need in our workplace, and these are the kind of skills we’re looking for.’ ”

The program grew out of the province’s registered apprenticeship program or RAP, which allows high school students to get started on a paid apprenticeship during school.

The province promotes this program, which combines on-the-job training, work experience and technical training, as key to building a highly skilled workforce essential to Alberta’s continuing prosperity.

But Vance says not all students are interested in the trades – some may want to get work experience in business, health care or other disciplines to help them decide on a career.

“The beauty of this program is that their academics will be integrated with the career pathway,” she says.

“The root of it is that we want to provide kids with relevance while they are in school. Kids are saying to us that they don’t understand why they have to do something. This program will show them the relevance of a career interest area.”

For Moledina, one of seven students enrolled in the pilot summer work program, the experience is already paying off. Along with E.P. Scarlett student Nabeel Ramji and Western high school student Jade Lam, Moledina has been hired by TransCanada Corporation to work over July and August.

Shannon Oatway photo, Business Edge
Irfanali Moledina, left, joins Nabeel Ramji and Jade Lam as they enjoy their summer jobs at TransCanada Corporation.

“Just over the last couple of weeks I’ve learned so much about stuff I didn’t know, and exactly how the company works. As well, I got a sense of how life in the business world is, and the different things you have to know,” says Moledina, who has been updating market information and performing some basic profit and loss calculations. “Working in the power marketing area has been a very interesting experience for me, and now I might even consider changing my career as I go through post-secondary.”

Tracy Mazgaj, a recruiter in TransCanada’s human resources department, says the program is helping to expose students to careers in business, giving them hands-on experience to help make their minds up about a career. Students went through a formal interview process before they were hired.

“We’re a company that likes to look forward in terms of sourcing future talent, so this helps us find some interested students who are thinking of making a career in the business world,” says Mazgaj. “It also gives the students a window into the world of business . . . if they’ve got a bent for it, it’s a great opportunity to test it.”

Students who express an interest in “majoring” in a particular pathway during the school year will be eligible to work in that area over the summer months, and could be placed by the school board in a paid work environment such as a business, a hospital or a construction site at a minimum salary of $8 an hour and with the regular supervision of a teacher. They’ll also earn credits towards graduation.

During the academic year, students will remain in their home schools, but since not all of Calgary’s 22 public high schools will be able to offer each pathway, students can opt to attend specific classes at other high schools if their area of interest is offered there.

The first of 10 career streams now under development – which will eventually include business and finance, arts and communication, information technology, science and technology, tourism and possibly international studies – will be piloted at Lord Beaverbrook High School this fall. All the career streams are being designed to meet Alberta Learning curriculum requirements, and all worksites will be approved by the Calgary school board.

Junior Achievement and the Calgary business community have been integral to the development of the career pathways approach. An international non-profit organization dedicated to partnering the business community with the education system, JA is already entrenched in the school system through various programs – including optional courses on entrepreneurship, workforce readiness skills and the economics of staying in school – at the elementary, junior high and high school level.

“We realized that Junior Achievement already had an incredible program in our schools, and we couldn’t work in isolation as we developed this pathway. So we’re asking them to develop (the curriculum) with us,” adds Vance.

Cathy Millar, director of resource development for JA’s southern Alberta chapter, says adding a business and finance stream to standard curriculum is a win-win situation for both students and the business community.

“It helps young people understand the impact business has on our economy,” says Millar. “A healthy business helps fuel a healthy economy, and so we’re all winners in that regard.”

JA’s company program, where students set up their own companies, will be a compulsory component of the business and finance pathway, and also a prerequisite for any student who wishes to apply for the business and finance summer internship program.

Vance says other Calgary companies, including several homebuilders, are lining up to offer placements for students next year if the program is deemed a success. More than 8,000 local employers have already participated in the CBE’s existing work-experience program.

Senior officials from Alberta Learning will be in Calgary for a two-day tour of career path worksites on Aug. 19, and Vance says presentations are also being made to high school and junior high school principals. She estimates more than $7 million is needed to get the entire program off the ground, and says the board is approaching the federal government and industry for funding. Alberta Human Resources and Development is also helping finance the current program.

“I think it’s awesome, because I’ve always been interested in business,” notes Moledina. “It’s a great opportunity for students to get interested in business and actually experience how the business world works.”

(For more information on the business and finance pathways and other JA programs, go to www.jasouthalberta.org)