BY DANIEL SIMONS AND JONATHAN WHITE
Senior Grace Fening works on her laptop which is how she gets a majority of her assignments done. Fening says, “We didn’t have a laptop when I was a kindergartner. I don’t think I even knew what one was; we just had a huge desktop that took forever to start up.”
The world we live in today is an increasingly dynamic one with the continuous progress of technology. With this technology being built, there are many different jobs that are opening that have never been a job at one point. Until now. According to Shannon Kromer, Director of Curriculum and Instruction, there are a bevy of new jobs out there. This includes jobs like app designers, Youtube partners, social media managers, and sustainability managers.
“These are big money jobs, and it is something we have to do for education to prepare our students for careers we didn’t even know were out there,” says Kromer.
This is the goal of Destination 2026.
Destination 2026 seeks a district initiative “to prepare the students of Mariemont, Terrace Park, and Fairfax for an ever-changing society by looking at what other schools around the country and explore what excellent instruction is being used to get the students ready for the ever-changing society,” says Kromer.
“It is called ‘2026’ because that is when the kindergarten students graduate,” Kromer said. Kromer later went on to say that it wasn’t just for kindergarten students, but for the entire district of students.
Steve Estepp, superintendent, states that this initiative isn’t just for the kindergarten students. Estepp states, “We are constantly thinking about how to evolve as a school to be ready for tomorrow.”
Destination 2026 is looking at introducing internships for high school students that count as credits to extend learning and professional development. When it’s not uncommon for college students to change their major two or three times, this type of forward thinking allows students to get a feel for what field they may want to go into.
With technology constantly reshaping the workplace and the way we communicate, preparing students for jobs that may not exist yet is a difficult task, according to Kromer. Estepp outlines Destination 2026 focus on molding students who can, “think creatively, reason systematically, and work collaboratively.” This recipe for success is becoming more and more important in a world where knowledge is easily attainable and simply memorizing facts has diminishing value, says Estepp.
So far, the parameters of the program are open for good reason, “I don’t want to put parameters on this yet because I don’t want to limit dreams,” says Estepp.
When asked how she feels about 2026, Senior Grace Fening said, “I remember Mrs. Neumann once asked our class what the point of knowing anything is if you can just google anything. No one had a good answer, so I think this 2026 plan is good idea.”
