Westwood Students Attend Job Shadow Day at TyRex

Westwood High School academy students partnered with community businesses on Monday, October 10, 2016 to spend a half-day in the professional world as part of the school’s job shadowing program. A total of 38 students visited one of the 10 participating businesses during the job shadow day, which was held on a Round Rock ISD student holiday. The business selections were based on student academies, which included the Public Service Academy, the Science Technology Engineering and Math (STEM) Academy and the Business and Industries Academy. Participating businesses consisted of the TyRex Group, 3M, A+ Federal Credit Union, BLGY Architecture, City of Austin Prosecutor’s Office, Community Impact Newspaper, Halff Associates, O’Connell Robertson, TrueNorth Consulting,  and Capital Metro.

TyRex Group focuses on integrating itself into the community, making a partnership with Westwood a priority to invest in the future. “We are residents of the community, and we want to know what’s going on around us and how we can make it better,” Communications Director Joel Coffman said. “As a technology company, these STEM Academy students are going to be tech employees one day, and we are helping to create a better class of talent for the future workforce.” Along with Joel, TyRex Group Principal John Bosch Jr. and Megladon VP of Engineering Daniel Hogberg were also able to provide the students with a glimpse into their lives at TyRex and give them the grand tour of the TyRex facility.

Westwood junior Joanna McDonald, a STEM Academy student and Academy Ambassador, was one of nine students who visited the TyRex Group. “As an academy ambassador, job shadowing gives me a better perspective on STEM jobs and the inner workings of the company,” Joanna said. “Job shadowing has been pretty fun. I liked seeing the different testing labs and how they customize tests for different products.”

Jenny Zhang, a Westwood High School sophomore and Academy Ambassador, had the chance to shadow Daniel and stated, “I enjoyed learning more about the inner workings of company management, and the tour of the facility was eye-opening in the sheer scope of specialization. I hope that we’ll be able to maintain contact in the coming years when I have questions on chemical engineering or fiber optics.”

Special thanks to Cristina Nguyen, Round Rock ISD Community Relations Coordinator, for her contributions to this article.