The NeMAC website hosts a wide variety of resources for parents, students, and educators about the opportunities available in manufacturing education here in Nebraska.

We’re lucky to have a wide variety of institutions that offer skill and STEM-heavy curriculums to help fill the need for future workers and manufacturers. For educators, it’s always rewarding when students return with the benefits of their education to pour that learning back into the success of Nebraska.

Two graduates of McCook High School are bringing their knowledge back to southwestern Nebraska as recently hired teachers at the very same school they graduated from! As the reported, the school district has recently been inclined to hire “students with local ties” that understand the school district and town. With a fantastic education from McCook high school, it only makes sense to repurpose the education back into the community and give back.

As approved on Monday night, Jacob Curl will be returning to teach industrial tech and Joe Vetrovsky will be a resource teacher. Curl’s college education was also in Nebraska, with a 2013 degree from University of Nebraska in agricultural education (with an emphasis in industrial technology education). His teaching experience includes time at Lincoln Southeast High School and Lincoln Northeast High School teaching woodworking and drafting.

Joe Vetrovsky also graduated in 2013, but from Doane College in Crete, Nebraska. He has taught special education at Arlington Elementary School in Arlington, Nebraska and student-taught special education at Crete Elementary School. Vetrovsky also began to pursue his Master’s degree at Doane College in the summer of 2013.

On Monday night, seven other teaching contracts were also approved, including one for a new agricultural instructor. Tracy Cooper has been teaching vocational agriculture at Hayes Center Public Schools since 2011, and will be the new head of agricultural education in McCook Public Schools.

Board member Shane Messersmith said to the Gazette that Curl was a FFA student at MHS when Messersmith hired him at a labor auction, so “I know he’s a hard worker. After he was done working for me, he was ready to go into education.”

For students and parents alike, McCook’s examples of born and bred Nebraska talent returning in vital fields such as industrial technology is an inspiring reason to appreciate the superiority of Nebraska skills. Especially as the issue of the skills gap remains at the forefront of many manufacturers minds, it’s evident that the high school level is attempting to strengthen the state economy with programs and investing in their own graduates.

Whether agriculture, manufacturing, technology, or even education are your passion, Nebraskan schools are dedicated to not only giving you the skills to follow these dreams, but to provide jobs after they do so.

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