School district hires high schoolers for summer help

Troy School District is continuing a program this year to employ as many of its high school students as possible. On July 25 the head of maintenance, Keith Haggerty, was overseeing 12 student workers.

“It’s something that’s been a priority of mine,” said principal and superintendent Jacob Francom as he gestured to a group of three students moving concrete outside his office window. “There’s just not a lot of jobs in Troy for kids.”

Although the numbers of workers vary according to who is attending camp and who is on vacation, the students work a 40 hour week when present.

This summer, the high school is tearing up concrete walkways to extend its heating system and replacing sections of roof along with all of the regular summer maintenance like painting classrooms and hallways, waxing floors, deep cleaning classrooms and maintaining lawns.

“They’re [student workers] doing full blown construction this year,” said Haggerty. “It used to be that we could do one big project a summer as well as the regular maintenance, and that would be it. Having the kids do a lot of the preparation work really frees up the custodians and we get a lot more done, and obviously it’s more affordable for the school to hire students than contractors.”

Taylor Carter, Kylie Carr and Royal Johnson are on the roof of the old high school building, accessed through a classroom window. It’s early morning and the sun is low still and the three are busy releasing screws using handheld drivers and pulling up roofing material before the roofing contractor arrives later in the day to replace the roof.

“Can’t we work night shift?” jokes Carr, wiping her forehead on her sleeve. “It’s so hot up here.”

All jokes aside, all three workers appear enthusiastic about their summer employment.

Carter, who is returning for her second summer, said “it’s prepared me for a lot of different jobs.”

Johnson and Carr both graduated this year. “It gives me something to do,” said Johnson, who has saved $4000 from his summers working for the school.

Carr, who is 18 and therefore able to drive the tractor, said she has built up a range of skills, including operating the tractor, lawnmowers and power tools.

Haggerty said a busload of school district employees, including all of the student workers, is headed to Whitefish on Monday, July 31, to attend a safety training.

“We have weekly safety meetings, as well as daily briefings on what we’re doing that day,” Haggerty said. “And yes, they go to all the summer trainings with us. We want them to be able to have as many things to put on a resume as possible, so we get them on the tractor and we get them to the trainings.”

Haggerty believes every student has their strengths.

“I’ve just been teaching a sophomore how to sheetrock — and she’s incredibly talented,” Haggerty said, commenting that hard work is not defined by gender. “For most of these things, you need a hand, and a thumb, and if you’ve got those, you can do a good job.”