Stillwater, OKLA. - The “Instructionators” at the Oklahoma Department of Career Technology have found a way to raise money for United Way and meet organizational goals at the same time. It’s called the Career Tech Challenge. It’s retro, strategic and a great community service.
Human Resources Benefits Specialist Liz Walton convened the employees who organized the month of lunch hour and evening activities. The “Challenge” has recruited more than half of the 200 plus staff members at Career Tech to compete in everything from spelling bees to bowling. It’s actually a throwback to the “Vo Tech Olympics” from the 1980’s and marks a cost effective change-of-pace from more formal teambuilding exercises.
Four teams, The Brady Bunch, The Instructionators, The Remarkables and King Greg’s Road Warriors rose to the challenges. Each team designed a flag, a motto and a cheer. In fact, voting on the best also brought in United Way dollars. The competition was hot and heavy from The Instructionator’s “Weapons of Mass Instruction” to the Road Warrior’s “On the Road to Education” to the Remarkable’s fire breathing purple cow and “Carpe’ Bovine” motto. The Brady Bunch sported team colors of black and tie-dyed.
Walton says the series of activities have been a lot of fun but the benefits to Career Tech are many. “Like many workplaces, everyone gets so focused on their own projects, they forget to just “get to know” the folks in the next department,” she says. “The networking developed in a project like “The Challenge” actually increases productivity and creativity across the organization as people make contacts that can be called upon in future projects.”
Admission to several of the competitions was a can of food for Harvest II, another beneficiary of the Challenge. Events included dry synchronized swimming, paper airplane races, an egg toss, volleyball, relays, Fear Factor and ping pong.
The competition has also revealed hidden talents and personality facets of employees and administrators at Career Tech. An opening ceremony’s demonstration of “Dry Synchronized Swimming” by Higher Administration was so popular; it developed into a new challenge sport.
Walton says the spelling bee almost turned into a contact sport when the crowd booed the judges over the difficulty of the spelling words. She says they began with words from the lists students use in the national spelling bee – even offering a definition if the speller so chose. It turned out that knowing “argali” is a large wooly sheep and “arolium” is the lobe found on many insects was not useful to the contestants. Manager of Organization and System Development Sarah Mussett was the eventual winner, correctly spelling “larithmics”—the scientific study of the quantitative aspects of populations.
Seventy-three employees from the four teams participated in the bowling competition. They had so much fun, that Career Tech is considering a quarterly bowling night for the whole staff.
By week’s end, the Brady Bunch was leading in point totals, but two final events and the logo competition kept the title up for grabs. Even more important to United Way, The Challenge was only the preview event to the employee pledge card drive at Career Tech.
Walton says Career Tech has always been a strong United Way supporter, but this year’s events were a way to give back to employees as well.
Jim Comer, is chairing the Career Tech United Way campaign this year, which will officially kick off Monday.
United Way Executive Director Shelley Ricker says the Campaign Divisions are all working now. United Way Board Members are beginning personal calls to Stillwater small business owners as part of the “Business Blitz”. About 25% of the $740,000 campaign has been turned in to the United Way office. A big response has come from the residential mailings that have been sent. Two more are scheduled to go in a week. Inserts in the City of Stillwater utility bills have netted many donations this year.
Donations to the United Way may be made at the United Way office, 109 East 9th Avenue in Downtown Stillwater and by mail at P. O. Box 308, Stillwater, 74076.
The local United Way website has a great deal of information relating to the campaign and to the agencies supported by the United Way campaign. Contributions may be made online, too, as the website is secure at www.stillwaterunitedway.org.
This is the 53rd United Way campaign in the Stillwater Area. Since 1952, $13 million has been raised in the area and invested in local agencies to assist area residents.
