Answering a Call for Role Models

Anadarko teamed with Junior Achievement, an organization that brings professionals to school classrooms to teach basic principles of business and free enterprise to youngsters. Attorneys, engineers, accountants, landmen and other professionals from Anadarko entered the classrooms of an at-risk primary school and middle school in Conroe Independent School District in Texas.

Educated consumers, employees and investors are vital to the economic viability of our country and the world. Understanding how our local, state, national and world economies work are concepts young children can learn early and apply in other studies such as math, reading and social studies. Having these lessons taught by a businessperson only enhances the learning experience.

This is why Anadarko teamed with Junior Achievement, an organization that brings professionals to school classrooms to teach basic principles of business and free enterprise to youngsters. Attorneys, engineers, accountants, landmen and other professionals from Anadarko entered the classrooms of an at-risk primary school and middle school in Conroe Independent School District in Texas. Both schools, which have little parental involvement and a great need for volunteers, welcomed Anadarko employees who taught more than 500 classroom hours in just one semester.

While the lessons taught through Junior Achievement are important, the schoolteachers and Anadarko volunteers agree that the greater benefit is the experience of students interacting with professionals other than their teachers. "Until Anadarko came to our campus, our students had little or no interaction with business people," commented Pat Taliaferro, principal at Travis Intermediate School. "The volunteers are not only role models for our highly at-risk population, but they are living proof that skills learned in the classroom are really used in the business world."