Students at Catasauqua High School are now being recognized for more than just their academic achievements, thanks to the new Student of the Semester program.

Through this program, students are recognized for positive employability skills, such as problem solving, communication, collaboration, leadership, work ethic, global awareness, career management and information technology.

The idea for the program was hatched in August 2019 when Ashley Schmidt, career facilitator, and Leslie Estrada, Spanish teacher and community liaison, attended a tour of a local business through the Educator in the Workplace program.

“The previous Student of the Semester program focused on academic success, but we know some of our hardest-working kids struggle to get As, and one of the outcomes from the 2018-19 Educator in the Workplace experience was an employability skills poster for every teacher K-12 to display in their classrooms,” Schmidt and Estrada said.

The women reported they got together at Starbucks after the tour and started brainstorming ideas on how to implement the program at CHS. They used the employability skills poster as a template of what skills and attributes they wanted to recognize.

They brought the information to Adam Schnug, CHS principal, who was excited to support the updated program, according to Schmidt and Estrada.

The women noted they understand education needs business and business needs education, so they reached out to local businesses for support. According to Estrada, they received a great deal of positive feedback from the local community.

The program’s community partners and educational supporters include Biery’s Port, Blocker’s Coffeehouse, GR Electric, Pie’s On Pizzeria, Palermo’s Italian Grill, Texas Roadhouse of Trexlertown, The Gas House and Tony’s Top Cat Bar and Grill.

There were 32 students recognized at the first Student of the Semester program, held Jan. 23 at the high school. In addition to recognizing the winning students, attendees at the program were treated to a guest speaker - Vincent Smith, CHS graduate, Catasauqua Borough Council president and local business/property owner.

The students honored were Katie Weiss, Evan Bargher, Katie Verenna and Madison Harth for problem solving/critical thinking; Emily Eisenhard, Dariana Diaz, Maylea Cora and Anthonie Hunsicker for communication; Brianna Bashore, Andrew Schwartz, Melissa Contreras and Dominik Bennett for collaboration; Mackenzie Brobst, Valerie Davidheiser, Victoria Hurley and Gabriel Gurrea for information technology; Bailey Witt, Randall Johnson, Priscilla Schaller and Donovan Ahart for career management; Hannah Kurczeski, Amber Kalnas, Avery Daku and Gage Oswald for leadership; Rebecca James, Emily Abbott and Emily Miller for global awareness; and Tobias Burgher, Colin Germano, Olivia Emery, Haley Lewis and Nevaeh Curry for professionalism/work ethic.

These students received a certificate detailing what skill they were nominated for, which is also listed on the student’s transcript. This skill can be identified on the student’s resume when they are applying to jobs in the future.

“In Catasauqua, we understand developing skills, such as problem solving/critical thinking, oral/written communication, collaboration, information technology, career management, leadership, global awareness and professionalism are just as, if not more, important indicators of future success,” Estrada and Schmidt said.

Moving forward, Estrada and Schmidt hope to involve more community partners, more guest speakers and more support for the students.

“We plan to identify creative solutions to prepare today’s students to become tomorrow’s workforce,” they said.

Before the second Student of the Semester program could be held, schools were closed due to the COVID-19 pandemic.