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BOE checks NMTI summer program
PSS
Members of the Board of Education and some members of CNMI Public School System leadership check in on the classroom of Northern Marianas Technical Institute’s culinary instructor Chef Ben Babauta Jr. yesterday morning. (PSS)
Board of Education chair Andrew L. Orsini, vice chair Herman Atalig, and Education Commissioner Dr. Alfred B. Ada dropped by the Northern Marianas Technical Institute yesterday as part of efforts to expand the partnership between the Public School System and NMTI.
The three PSS officials sat in on classes that were in progress as part of NMTI’s summer program for 40 Tanapag Middle School students and also visited NMTI’s culinary, automotive, welding, electronics, and construction classes.
In a brief interview with Orsini, he spoke on the need to further develop the local workforce. He said it is important that he and the board think futuristically when it comes to PSS students, and see the need to develop the CNMI’s local workforce in the long-term. “We never know. …The foreign labor that [the CNMI has] right now is good, but we don’t know when [a] phase-out [of these foreign workers] may occur. If that happens, at least we’re prepared with our local people,” said Orsini.
Orsini said he was pleased with what he saw yesterday and hopes to see more opportunities in the future. “Hopefully next year we can [expand] more into these, and I think it’s great because all the students we’ve met so far from our visit at [the Northern Marianas College] and then over here, I think it’s a wonderful thing, it’s a beautiful thing,” said Orsini.
