Area schools utilize online platform to assist students with career paths

Wes Tomlinson, The Decatur Daily, Ala.
·2 min read

May 1—To prepare students for the workforce, the Decatur-Morgan County Chamber of Commerce is sponsoring an online platform for area high schools that tests for students' strengths and abilities and matches them with potential careers.

Amber Fortenberry, director of talent development and recruitment at the chamber, said the chamber made its first investment in the platform, YouScience, in December 2019 for high schools in Decatur, Hartselle, and Morgan County Schools. She said the chamber made the investment in an effort to address the workforce shortage in Morgan County. All three systems are using the program.

"We want to have homegrown talent here in Decatur and Morgan County," Fortenberry said. "YouScience will actually list local community colleges and jobs in the area and tell the students what positions they employ at those jobs."

YouScience provides a 90-minute assessment that students take and provides them with career choices best suited to the students' abilities.

"The program helps the child know what they're really good at doing rather than what they're interested in or pre-exposed to," Fortenberry said.

Danville High sophomore Emily Lacy took her YouScience assessment last month.

"There were 12 different tests and the first one was about numbers and another test that was about sequences and patterns," Lacy said. "Like it had pictures and we had to say what the pictures meant to us."

Lacy said her test results suggested she had abilities that suited her for a career in speech pathology, teaching or social work. She said speech pathology stood out to her the most.

"I'm looking to take some dual-enrollment classes where I can go ahead and get into the program," Lacy said.

Lacy said that along with the results, the YouScience program also showed her skills she could develop that would benefit her if she were to pursue speech pathology.

"I was really looking forward to seeing what I needed to focus on to be able to be good at speech pathology," Lacy said. "In the results it would say, 'In this job, this would benefit you and you need to really work on this,' so that really helped me to learn what I need to do to be better at that job."

Monica Doherty, career coach at Morgan County Schools, said the pandemic prevented her school district from using the YouScience program as extensively as it wanted when the chamber first made the program available.

"The first time we just focused on our ninth graders, but then (COVID-19) happened and messed everything up," Doherty said. "We started it again this year to try to get all our other high school grade levels access to it."

There are currently 76 schools in 15 districts in Alabama that use the YouScience program.

— wesley.tomlinson@decaturdaily.com or 256-340-2438.