FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:                       February 2, 2000

Groudhog Job Shadow Day 2000 A Big Success

Highlights from Across the Region Show
Momentum Building for California Intern Summer 2000

SAN RAFAEL, California -- Congratulations to everyone who had a hand in this year's Groundhog Job Shadow Day. Knowing that many activities will continue this month and beyond for job shadowing, it is a good time to step back and revel in all that was accomplished today. Here are just a few highlights that have trickled in...

In Marin County, over 200 8th graders from San Jose Middle School shadowed professionals at businesses and organizations across the county. Some of these include Mattel Interactive, the Marin Civic Center, AccountMate, and the Buck Institute on Aging. Four students and a teacher also accompanied Assembly Member Kerry Mazzoni to the Capitol, and one student was reported to actually testify in front of the Assembly Education Committee during a hearing on school facilities. The Marin County partnership really viewed Groundhog Day as an excellent way to expose middle school students to the opportunities available to them in High School through STC.

In the East Bay, 200 students went into the community from the CA School for the Deaf in Fremont. Employer hosts ranged from high tech, to hospitals to the US Coast Guard in Alameda. Between West Contra Costa and Oakland alone, over 1200 students had job shadowing experiences with great results.

In San Mateo, students successfully shadowed high profile folks including:
Dr. John Bayles, Superintendent, Cabrillo Unified School District
Jim Datzman Executive Director, South San Francisco Chamber of Commerce
Richard Gordon Supervisor, SMC Board of Supervisors President, Third District
Mary Griffin Supervisor, SMC Board of Supervisors, First District
Robert Schwab Director, SMC Human Services Agency
Dr. John Mehl Associate Superintendent, San Mateo Co Office of Education
Diane Centoni Director, San Mateo Co Office of Education ROP

From Workforce Silicon Valley, we have the amazing report that over 1500 students went out for shadows with companies like Intel, Adobe, NASDAQ, Mentor Graphics, Plantonics, SGI, Siemens, Applied Materials, Yahoo and Pacific Bell. Mayor Ron Gonzales also had a student shadow for the day. Many of these companies hosted as many as 60 students at one time!

In San Francisco, students shadowed employees all over the City as well as 5 students who followed San Francisco Supervisors and one lucky high schooler who worked a day on the coat tails of Mayor Willie Brown. The SF Chamber, as always, played a huge role in making Groundhog Day a success, and even Rhea Serpan, President & CEO of the Chamber, and Roberta Achtenberg, Executive VP, hosted students. Roberta had her student, along with a Senior VP from Bank of America and his student shadow, be guests on her regular TCI Cable program talking about job shadowing and their experiences. Speaking of BofA, they were one of a number of dedicated STC partner companies that not only hosted a large number of students, but also used this day to kick off a four month mentoring program with many of the same students and employees.

In Sonoma, the City Council of Petaluma started the festivities with a Proclamation for today being officially Groundhog Job Shadow Day, no doubt upstaging the Governor who issued a similar proclamation for the State just yesterday. The Sonoma County Office of Education may also run a journalism 'contest' for kids who shadow and who write an article for publication in the Partners magazine about their experience on Feb. 2. Beyond that, students shadowed acupuncturists, archaeologists, morticians, multi-media e-commerce folks, and to the Bodega marine lab.

One school in Solano County, Travis Education Center High School participated for the first time in Shadow Day. They placed students in David Grant Medical Center, Scandia Elementary School, Wells Fargo Bank, City of Fairfield Assistant Manager's office, and various students who went to work with their parents for the day.

Beyond all these local stories, numerous print and television stories will air covering Groundhog Job Shadow Day. In fact KPIX Channel 5 and KRON hosted students as well as numerous newspapers and magazines including the SJ Mercury, the Marin IJ, and the Tri Valley Herald (just to name a few). Channel 5 (our hero) is running a story tonight on the 5:00 News in Hog Day. Other print tentatively confirmed include the SF Chronicle, the Oakland Tribune, the Contra Costa Times, The Marin IJ, the Tri Valley Herald, the Valley Times, and more.

Hat's off to Junior Achievement of the Bay Area for doing a stellar job in matching students with employers, supporting the work of the Bay Area School-to-Career Partnerships and generating significant media coverage for this important campaign.

Keep up the great work everyone!

Contact:
Ken Sorey, Director of Communications
BaySCAN c/o Autodesk Foundation
111 McInnis Parkway, San Rafael, CA 94903
phone: (415) 507-6290
fax: (415) 507-6339
http://bayscan.org

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