Northridge received $688,000 in state funding to purchase new equipment for career technical education, mostly for programs that are meant to bring jobs and community to Harrison Twp.
Northridge has six career tech offerings, five of which are run by the district and one, a nursing program, run as a satellite program at the Miami Valley Career Tech Center. The most popular program is a welding program, which is almost full, according to district administrators.
While students are still encouraged to go to the Miami Valley Career Tech Center, that center is at capacity. The dozens of programs offered at the career tech center may also not be a good fit for everyone, so there’s a push in the state to get more students into satellite programs inside of local schools.
Kodi Hardigree, the welding teacher for the school and a 2012 Northridge graduate, said as someone who came from a lower-income, smaller community, the trades were a way for him to support his family.
It took Hardigree a while to get to welding. He initially had other jobs coming out of high school and came to welding by way of a friend.
“I feel special to come in here and give these kids these opportunities to go out and make careers, not just jobs,” Hardigree said.
Northridge had 1,649 students in its entire district in the 2023-2024 school year, according to state data, one of the smallest districts in Montgomery County. The elementary, middle and high school all fit into one building in Harrison Twp.
It’s also not a particularly wealthy district: the median income is $36,956, according to the Harrison Twp. website, and just 17% of the population has a bachelor’s degree or higher.
Jason Ware, a Northridge junior, has been in the district’s welding career tech program, but he recently had a job interview with Local Sheet Metal 24, a sheet metal union. He hopes to take the job and start over the summer as an apprentice, he said, and then move up the ranks.
“I’ll be able to go to school and make money and also get all my credits,” Ware said.
helped him get an interview for the job, Ware said.
Many of the career tech high schoolers I’ve talked to have plans to go into engineering, nursing or other degree pathways. Ware plans to go into the trades, one of the state’s most in-demand careers, and into a union job.
Andrea Townsend, the district’s director of human resources, pupil services and communications, said the district already had some programs that were career-tech oriented before 2022, like a class that turned into the district’s business and marketing program.
But the classes have also been a way to create community. One of the courses is a Parks and Rec track, a subset of an agriculture program, that is working to manage space in Harrison Twp. as a community park.
The entire community has been working to make sure Northridge kids get as many opportunities as they can, Townsend said.
“None of this, not one bit of it, could be done without our partnerships,” Townsend said.
Partnerships with Harrison Twp., the local union, and the Miami Valley Career Tech Center were key to the development of the programs, Townsend said.
“When we when we tell them what we’re doing and what we’re about, everybody is like, that’s awesome. How can I help?” said Joe Miller, Northridge computer science and information technology teacher.
Miller said he got into the career tech pipeline because he realized some of his American Government students were tolerating his class just so they could go to a shop class. After shop class ended at Northridge, Miller asked if there was anything he could do to help the kids who seemed like they wanted more. Eventually, he transitioned into the IT and computer science class.
Now, he said his class is the one that his students seem to come to school for. He came in early on a day when he had a substitute teacher because his students wanted to get into the computer science lab.
“Every kid should have some class that they like, no matter what that is,” Miller said.
Eileen McClory in the Dayton Daily News education reporter.
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