10 New Courses Coming Fall 2025 at Career Impact Academy – Grand Forks Herald

GRAND FORKS – The Career Impact Academy is coming online to Grand Forks Public Schools next year with 10 new courses in topics ranging from precision agriculture to aviation.

Eric Ripley, executive director of career education and technology, on Monday presented the more than two dozen new, existing and expanded curricular offerings for the new career and technical education facility for the Grand Forks and Grand Forks Air Force Base school boards.

“What you have before you tonight is a very important and symbolic milestone for this program,” Ripley said.

When it opens in the fall, the campus will offer all-new courses in areas such as culinary arts and sports medicine in nine program areas, including automotive technology, aerospace, construction and health sciences.

It will also offer many programs previously hosted at Grand Forks Central and Red River high schools, with expanded coursework in many of these disciplines, as well as host the school district’s work-based learning program.

Courses at the Career Impact Academy are taught in three 100-minute blocks, as opposed to the seven-hour schedule used at the high schools, due to the time required to travel to and from the Gateway Drive campus.

It also means that Career Impact Academy courses won’t be available to freshmen because they have more required courses and tighter schedules and “two-hour block courses don’t often fit into a ninth-grader’s schedule,” Ripley said.

Instead, freshmen can take several introductory courses at Red River or Grand Forks Central in preparation for higher-level courses in their sophomore, junior and senior years.

Students from neighboring districts, such as Larimore, will also be able to take classes at the new campus. Ripley said a survey from that school district showed that 50 out of 80 high school students were interested in taking a course at the Career Impact Academy.

Career and Technical Education consulted with many industry partners in selecting the course offerings, Ripley said.

Some proposed courses, such as welding, were left on the cutting room floor due to space or cost constraints.

The new campus will be staffed by a mix of existing employees and new employees. Ripley expects to hire new staff in March after students register for their fall classes.

Many of the new hires will be recruited directly from the subject areas targeted by the new courses and will receive provisional teaching certificates as they complete graduate coursework to become fully certified as educators.

Existing staff are expected to mentor these new hires in their first year as educators.

Other new curricular offerings for next year include an advanced orchestral ensemble for audition-only sophomores, juniors and seniors, as well as a leadership class that places general education students and students with disabilities in the same classroom.

The district is also piloting a Spanish course for native speakers to accommodate the district’s rapidly growing multilingual population.

Monday was the annual joint meeting of the air base and city school districts. Although the air base’s only school, Nathan Twining Elementary and Middle School, is actually part of the Grand Forks School District, the base has its own appointed, rather than elected, school board.

Air Force Col. Reynaldo, 319th Reconnaissance Wing champion, presented the State of the Base update to board members on Monday.

Champion is the 319th’s mission support group commander; he took over from Col. David Castor in July after the latter retired.

Champion reported that B1-B bombers are expected to arrive at the base next month, after originally scheduled for November, and summarized a number of recent developments, including the $246 million in facility upgrades for which the base has been selected under the Air Force’s Disaster Resiliency. Program.

Board members also assessed

school district test score averages

as well as demographic data, such as the number of students receiving free or reduced-price meals and the share with individualized education plans.

Multilingual program coordinator Ivona Todorovic also discussed the substantive aspects

increase in the number of multilingual students in the district

of the past year and a summary of some of the program’s history.

In other news,

• Jacqueline Sevigny, lead counselor at Lewis and Clark Elementary, was honored as the Classified Employee of the Quarter, while Emily Dawes, a first grade teacher at Kelly Elementary, was honored as the Certified Employee of the Quarter.

Joshua Irvine covers K-12 and higher education and the Grand Forks County Commission for the Grand Forks Herald. He can be reached at [email protected].