The Tahoma School District is partnering with Green River College to further student’s education starting January 2018.

According to Leslie Moore, the dean for Branch Campuses and Continuing Studies at Green River, the school district came to Green River first with the idea of partnering.

“This is an opportunity for the school district and the college to partner and bring continuing education and classes to the Tahoma School District and surrounding area,” she said.

Continuing education is through the Career and Technical Education section of Tahoma High School. According to the website, this is a planned program of courses and learning experiences that begin with exploration of career options.

Moore said this is an extension to what is offered at the college.

She also said Tahoma High School is an ideal location for these classes because of their new remodel.

Dawn Wakeley from Tahoma High School’s executive director of Teaching and Learning said, “We see this as being the first step in expanded opportunities within our community for higher education experiences, again both for our students and adults in our community.”

The classes that will be offered at the high school are more skill and learning based. Moore said there will be no credits to be earned with these classes and that they are strictly for learning experiences only and will cost students.

“These are not state supported classes, these are self supported classes so yes there will be a fee like there is any other location that we offer classes,” Moore said. “These are non-credit classes, so they’re for lifelong learning. Lifelong learning is something that you pick… like writing fiction or dancing, or taking some art classes. Those are the things you take up because you want to learn that skill for bettering yourself and moving forward.”

Some of the classes included are photography, writing classes, water color painting, small business classes and possibly some computer classes according to Moore. She also said depending on the needs and wants of the community, they could add or take classes away.

Wakeley said there is an age limitation on who can take these classes, but was not able to specify the age limit.

According to Moore, the staff that will be teaching these classes at the high school will some new hires and some current staff members.

“All of them will be the facility that we hire, some of them are already on our staff here working at the college part-time and we will be hiring new instructors and hopefully some of the teachers at the high school will be teaching for us as well,” she said.

Moore said this is a true partnership with Tahoma and went onto say, “We’re very happy to be doing this and appreciate the invitation from the school district.”

Wakeley said she hopes these classes spark an interest with the students that they can carry over into college and at their future jobs.

“Some of them it might be for areas of interest because they have a passion for art but don’t necessarily see themselves doing that. Some of them may take them for personal enrichment and some of them may be doing it as college and career goal to get a leg up on,” Wakeley said.