Episode Details

Sean Garrett:
This program is working and this is exactly what we designed it to be. Full-time firefighter EMTs for Unified Fire Authority that come from this program. All home grown.

Dalton Hendricks:
If you want to do this job, it's a really good opportunity to come here and further yourself and put yourself ahead of other people that also want that same job. Place just has so many of the aspects of the real job that we got to practice for two years.

Anthony Godfrey:
Hello and welcome to the Supercast. I'm your host, Superintendent Anthony Godfrey. They were high school students already getting up close and personal hands-on experience at the Jordan Academy for Technology and Careers in their quest to become firefighters. On this episode of the Supercast, meet some recent Jordan School District graduates who spent this past summer on the front line, fighting wildland fires in Utah. Hear how they got a jump start on their careers in high school, enrolled in the JATC Fire Science Program. Find out what advice they have for current students eager to don their turnout gear and start their own careers as firefighters after graduation.

Anthony Godfrey:
We are here at the Jordan Academy for Careers and Technology at the South Campus, talking with the Fire Science and EMT Program Coordinator. Go ahead and introduce yourself.

Sean Garrett:
Yeah, my name is Sean Garrett, and I am the Coordinator for the Fire Science and EMT Program at JATC out here at the South Campus. I'm a full-time firefighter with the Unified Fire Authority and with just under 19 years full-time experience.

Anthony Godfrey:
You were here previously and now you're back. Tell us about that. You were part of the original program.

Sean Garrett:
That's correct. So I actually graduated high school in 2002 at Riverton High myself and took this class there. It was just called South Jordan Fire Science. It was taught at the South Jordan Fire Department Station 61 at that time. Then with all the changes to districts and everything else, the Jordan School District didn't have a program for a number of years. It was 2012-13, and the principal at the time, Jason Skidmore, reached out to us because we had an internship program that we were running in the Valley for all the work-based learning and CTE students, and he wanted to start a Fire Science Program. So that's all she wrote. So myself and a few others built the program, put the curriculum together, and we started teaching at the North Campus and that first class was 2013.

Anthony Godfrey:
We're going to talk to some former students now who are firefighters. Talk to me about that.

Sean Garrett:
So I'm staring at them right now and, you know, these three buttheads, they were high school students here. I believe it was two years ago. Those kids were successful in this program. They graduated high school, moved on to our Camp Williams seasonal wildland program, worked on getting, finishing, testing, getting their EMT certification. Then once they had their two years seasonal, they ended up hiring on full time with UFA. Right before I came out here as a coordinator, I was a fire training specialist so I also got to be one of th