Bengal = CAT

Fuquay-Varina High (home of the Bengals) has developed an award-winning Pre-Apprenticeship Program with Caterpillar, Inc.

The Caterpillar Assembly Pre-Apprenticeship is a year and a half program that prepares students for employment at the Caterpillar plant located in Clayton, NC.

Throughout the program, students take manufacturing related courses through Johnston Community College and work onsite at Caterpillar.  Students who complete the program will earn an Assembly Pre-Apprenticeship Certificate from Johnston Community College and 640 hours of on-the-job training at Caterpillar.  And they get paid for their work – $10/hour.

The model was recognized and awarded the 2014 Governor’s Award for Excellence in Workforce Development for Outstanding Innovative Partnership.

Kudos to Caterpillar and Korey Coon (HR Director) for the dedicated effort to bring these incredible opportunities to students at Fuquay-Varina High.  And to Dr. Vera Confer, FVHS Assistant Principal, for dedicating more than two years to move from idea to implementation.  Indeed, there are a team of individuals from Caterpillar, FVHS, and WCPSS Career and Technical Education who have been working non-stop to make this happen.

We’re about as proud as we can be here at WakeEd.  We introduced Caterpillar’s Korey Coon to Dr. Confer and FVHS over two years ago.  We’ll call it an inside connection and a win/win.  Dr. Julie Crain taught English at FVHS for 12 years and joined the Partnership in 2007.