The Mobile Theatre is a portable classroom designed to provide twelve to sixteen notebooks to be setup at any location being a high school, community center or a church. This portability allows the facilitators of LEFTHP to provide almost any instruction at any location.
The first purpose of the Mobile Theatre is to reach At-Risk–Youth whom have limited mobility to travel to educational providers or the funds to cover the cost of additional educational opportunities. The opportunities LEFTHP will provide include introduction to Microsoft products such as Word, Excel and PowerPoint to develop employable skills needed within the business world or to assist in gaining college entrance or success in college courses. Other employable skills developed are: resume writing, interviewing, professional attire and business etiquette. The second purpose of the Mobile Theatre is economic development of the High Point area where unemployment is 9.8 percent. Similar to the purpose above, economic development will address issues of employable skills in computer literacy, resume writing and interviewing skills. This will directed towards those whom have dropped out of school, passed high school age (18 to 24 year) who need help developing employable skills. These skills will be provided to who are unemployed, underemployed or seeking opportunities to better themselves in their career paths. The third purpose of the Mobile Theatre is to provide Leadership Development and Civic Capacity skills not only within High Point area, but also the surrounding areas around High Point. This will extend our leadership and communication training and ethic workshop into Archdale, Greensboro, Jamestown, Kernersville, Thomasville and Winston-Salem. With this purpose as well as the second, multiple facilitator may need to travel together to ensure multiple courses are available. |
IT for Youth is a program designed to follow the academic year of the average high school in High Point, N.C. Each month LEFT will host one or two workshops throughout the neighborhood of Lexington and Montlieu Avenues in computer literacy. These workshop will begin with basic computer knowledge and gradually work though Microsoft Office, including, but not limited to Excel, Word, PowerPoint, and Access. One goal is to mentor the students to earning their Microsoft Office Specialist certifications. With plan to include Adobe's Photoshop, and Dreamweaver for students in 2015.
If funding and time allows, our goal is to also incorporate Microsoft's more advanced programs that are sought after in the job markets into our training program. These include: Project 2013, SharePoint 2013 and SQL 2012. These programs require a server based system and individual user licenses which is will cost LEFT initial about $5,000 to $6,000 just to begin this process, with an annual cost of between $500 and $1,000. Why IT for Youth, It has been said, "children today are more techno-savey than any time in history." Does techno-savey refer to knowledge of how to create a spread sheet and analyzing a database? Or does it refer to chanting online, or gaming on multiple systems such as Xbox or PlayStation? The author spent hours teaching fellow business students how to use Microsoft Excel to create spread sheet for accounting and economic courses at a four year university. Or demonstrating the tools in Microsoft PowerPoint to present a professional class presentations. The issue, these students were juniors and seniors, they should have know Excel and PowerPoint by this stage in their academic career. Yet, these same students are expert on Facebook, texting, and gaming. The following articles provide some enlightenment to the situation of students knowing new technology, such as using an iPhone, but not being able to complete high school or community college assignments. Essential Computer Skills for a High School Student discuss that students don't always learn the essential educational usage of computer technology. The article ask the probing questions, "Can a student be considered well-versed in computers if they can play computer games, chat online, or surf the internet? Is it necessary to have high school students learn how to operate a word processor, a spreadsheet, or a presentation creator? What are the sufficient skills needed for high school students to prepare them in entering college or the workplace?" |
The following comment were taken from various employment and technical articles.
"MOS Certification stands for Microsoft Office Specialist. This certifies proficiency in a Microsoft Office application. Companies view the MOS as proof of skill competency in screening job candidates for a variety of positions. MOS Master Certification proves competency in all applications of Microsoft’s Office Suite (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Access, and Outlook)." The New Jersey Career Center There "is a consistently high demand for IT Professionals who have the skills and knowledge [MOS] necessary to configure, install and maintain Microsoft products." CRiSP360 |