Love your job? Share that love with students through this Beaufort-born project

Stephen Murray has little trouble connecting with children when he visits schools.

The Beaufort resident is a city councilman and business owner, including kazoo manufacturer Kazoobie Kazoos. The colorful plastic musical instruments make great giveaways when Murray visits schools.

“I’m kind of a unicorn in the career-day arena,” Murray said.

As the husband of an educator — his wife, Melissa, is English Language Arts coordinator for Beaufort County School District — Murray said students aren’t always exposed to a diverse field of possible careers.

As part of his Leadership South Carolina class this year, he spearheaded the creation of a website to connect professionals and educators looking for someone to talk to their class. The site, www.inspireacareer.com, has about 200 professionals signed up and targets 500 by the end of the month.

“I’ve always felt like it’s sort of disappointing, that there are a lot of ways to make a living in this country,” Murray said. “And if kids knew a lot of these opportunities existed, would that inspire them to do better in school or to have a goal that they might work towards instead of the traditional employment options?”

To participate, professionals create a profile on the website and include a photo, a description of their job and how far they are willing to travel. When a school needs a speaker for career day, an email will go out to those registered in the area with the location, date and offer to participate.

The leadership class raised $24,000 to develop the project, hiring a Charleston-based web development company that offered them a discount for the work.

Before the website is handed off and promoted to teachers, the project’s leaders hope to build the database of professionals.

Later this summer, the website will be turned over to S.C. Future Minds, a nonprofit organization that connects private resources to public schools and annually hosts the state’s Teacher of the Year ceremony.

Future Minds works with every school district in the process of selecting the award-winner. Its mission of marrying the private sector and public education often means money but also includes professional expertise, executive director Caroline Mauldin said.

“We have heard from those teachers — that they would love to have more community involvement, and they see the light in their students’ eyes when they meet a professional who talks about their career path and how they got there,” Mauldin said. “Those first-person stories make it real for students.”

Jennifer Wise, a member of Murray’s Leadership South Carolina class and the state’s teacher of the year in 2016, said the initial effort of connecting professionals with career days could lead to a similar approach to apprenticeships or other additional experience in the future.

Wise, a math teacher at Hand Middle School in Columbia, has had her husband talk to her classes about his job at the Department of Insurance. He explains what an actuary does and how spreadsheets work, she said.

“It’s really incredible the questions they ask and the genuine interest that gets bred from those opportunities to interact,” Wise said.

This story was originally published June 8, 2017 at 4:31 PM with the headline "Love your job? Share that love with students through this Beaufort-born project."