NORWOOD – The Seaway Career & Technical Education Center in Norwood has selected Olivia Chambers as the Potsdam Rotary Club Student of the Month for February.

Chambers is a student in the Education & Human Services Program. She is a student in the Canton Central School District and the daughter of Rodney and Tracy Chambers.

Education & Human Services is a two-year program that exposes students to a wide range of professional opportunities while allowing students to gain practical hands-on experience and effective communication skills. hroughout the program, students are engaged in hands-on, student driven instruction while learning about human development, effective teaching, lesson planning, child abuse, neglect prevention and counseling strategies.

Through Olivia’s time in the program, she has been involved in remote teaching with Norwood-Norfolk Central School and internships with ARC working with people with disabilities. During these opportunities, she was able to create and implement age appropriate lesson plans as well as helping to maintain a safe and healthy environment. She has learned many fundamental theories along with strategies and techniques when working with people ranging from birth to death.

Olivia will leave the program with three mandatory workshops that are required for New York State teaching and teaching assistant certification. They include: SAVE Schools, Mandated Reporting and DASA. When she leaves the program, she will have completed OSHA training along with many other skills acquired over the past year and a half.

The instructor, Kayla Merchant, has said the following about Olivia: “Olivia always comes to school willing to learn while helping her peers at the same time. Even on days when life has gotten in the way, Olivia has always powered through. She is respectful and an all-around great student. I am extremely lucky to have had the opportunity to teach her and get to know her.”

Students selected as Program Student of the Month for their class at Seaway Career & Technical Education Center include: Lucas Clarke, Auto Technology, Brasher; Daniel Dodds-Walters, Building Trades, Parishville-Hopkinton; Catherine Henry, Cosmetology, Canton; Wyatt Newman, Criminal Justice, Canton; McKensi Foster, Culinary Arts, Potsdam; Derek Morrill, HVAC, Potsdam; Gavin Thompsopn, Natural Resource Management, Canton, and Jack Barton, Software Development & Business Design, Brasher.