RCHS Business Department prepares students for advanced education and life

Jan Voiles

Through the years the business world changes and so has the Business Department at Rushville Consolidated High School. Department head Sharon Miller, Julie Wainwright and Diane Personett work together to help their students prepare for life.

“We used to train them for secretarial, specific jobs. Now we’re just trying to give them skills that are used in all kinds of jobs and personal life,” Miller explained.

“We think we present a lot of life skills,” Personett commented. “Some of our courses cover balancing your check books and that sort of things. Keyboarding is universally used and then (there are) the computer skills. We try to teach them so that they can not only go to other classes here and have those skills but they go out to college and then the professor is teaching them about science, but he says do a spread sheet and they know how to do that by having had our classes. We still feel like we’re prepping them, but more general skills instead of specific business skills, more life skills things.”

Wainwright added that students are required to do role playing where they have to get up and give presentations, providing them with skills needed as they go on to college or vocational school.

Classes include computer applications like PowerPoint, Excel, Desktop Publishing and web design. Accounting is offered some years, depending on enrollment.

“All freshmen have to take Digital Communication Tools,” Miller said. “Basically, it’s learning to control the keyboard.”

“That’s what was formerly keyboarding, formerly typing,” Wainwright added.

“Back when we offered shorthand it was mostly girls studying secretarial and we had the COE where they went out and worked half days,” Miller recalled. “We still have a lot of girls out there in the community that went through that program that have good jobs in Rushville.”

The biggest changes in the field of business education has been in technology.

“We’ve gone from manual typewriters to computers,” Miller remarked.

“Most of the students are just preparing for college or vocational school. It has become that you need more training between here and the job market,” Personett added.

All three instructors strongly advocated students getting some form of higher education or training before entering the business world.

The students have changed as well.

“We’ve always had good students and bad students, but it seems like they’re not as conscientious as they used to be,” Miller observed. “Some of them are very knowledgeable and some of them think they know more than they really do.”

“It’s harder for us to compete because they have so much electronic stimulation and fancy things and all that. Of course, because we don’t sing it or make a video about it,” Personett reflected. “They get so much more stimulation than they used to and have so many more inputs of information.”

“A lot of our classes aren’t targeted, like advanced something or another, so we get a mix. We have sophomores through seniors mixed in and there’s a maturity factor and different ability levels,” she continued.

The three teachers agreed that the student population and administration are to be commended.

“We have good kids here in Rush County. You hear so much negative about kids and all that; there is a lot of negative, but we have good kids in Rush County,” Personett reiterated. “Even the kids that we talk about that are discipline issues, you go someplace else and we’re not talking anything.”

“We have a positive environment and we’ve got nice computers, good equipment,” Wainwright observed.

“I think we have good administrative support too,” Miller said, “and when we go to conferences and talk to other teachers, we’re in really good shape.”

“And they support professional development so that we can try to keep up,” Personett said.

The main conference they attend to get updated is the annual Indiana Business, Marketing and Information Technology Conference.

“We have our fall conference and we get to talk to other teachers there and they have different sessions that are interesting,” Miller said.

All three became business teachers because of their interest in the field.

“I always enjoyed business classes so I went to Ball State and took the two year secretarial with hopes I could go on and teach,” Sharon Miller recalled. She taught one year at Tri High and 39 years at RCHS.

She and her husband Kenneth have two dogs and live in Knightstown.

Diane Personett also enjoyed studying business.

“I liked business in college. I coached at that time and I was looking for a way to do both so I went into business education. I thought that gave me the most options — if I didn’t like teaching then I could go out and find something else,” she remarked.

She is in her 21st year of teaching at RCHS. Her husband Tony is principal at Wilbur Wright Elementary in New Castle. They have two children, a son Tucker, age 8, and a daughter, Paige, who proudly declares she is four and a half years old. They attend Knightstown United Methodist Church.

Julie Wainwright shared Diane’s double interest.

“I went to Anderson and got a degree in marketing,” she explained. “I’m the same path as Diane; I wanted to coach so I thought if I go back two more years and get that teaching license. I’ve enjoyed it ever since. I made the right move.”

This is her 14th year at RCHS. She and her husband Andrew “Homer” Wainwright have two sons, 5-year-old Alex and 2-year-old Josh. They attend St. Paul’s United Methodist Church and Julie is a member of Tri Kappa sorority.



Jan Voiles can be contacted at jan.voiles@rushvillerepublican.com or at (765) 932-2222 ext. 107. Add a comment to this story at www.rushvillerepublican.com.

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