For more than 50 years, Junior Achievement of Southern Alberta has been engaging local business and community leaders in its mission to help students develop an entrepreneurial attitude, a solid and practical understanding of business and finance and a commitment to community. Junior Achievement of Southern Alberta reaches nearly 22,000 students every year with 1,400 dedicated volunteers. Junior Achievement provides a connection between education and the work world by giving youth the confidence and knowledge they need to define personal success, enhance their workforce readiness and pursue their dreams.
This year, 160 young men and women in grades 10, 11 and 12 gathered at the Strathmore Civic Centre on March 5th where they were joined by local career mentors as they share exciting aspects of their career. Students were exposed to a variety of career possibilities and were provided vital information regarding what education and qualifications would be necessary to fulfill their chosen career path.
The morning kicked off with a motivating speech by Jon Himmens. Mr. Himmens is a Corporate Director with a career background in Strategy, Financial Leadership, Governance, Pensions Management, Insurance, International Operations and Capital Markets. He currently serves on the Special Forces Pension Board, where he chairs the Assets and Liabilities Committee. He is employed by IBM Canada Ltd., as a Client Executive for Alberta and has worked for TransAlta Corporation, the London Stock Exchange, NatWest Blank PLC (UK) and a number of junior accounting firms.
With such an impressive resume, Mr. Himmens was the perfect choice for giving life and career advice to these young men and women. He spoke to them describing this time in their lives like driving through a fog. Not going can you not really see where you’re going, but often amazing opportunities, ‘side streets’, get missed. Himmens explained that events like the World of Choices Career Forum help lift that fog and can really bring clarity to where the students want to see themselves in the future.
Following Mr. Himmens remarks, the students broke into sessions where they were given the opportunity to move around to various tables and hear from the mentors of the specific industry. Chestermere was well represented as Pat Wise, Owner of Wise and Company, was the Accounting mentor and City of Chestermere Councillor, Jennifer Massig was tackling the genre of Civil Engineer/City Councillor.
For more information on Junior Achievement, please visit www.jasouthalberta.org.
