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Project Grade 7 Careers & CTE

Staffing Drenwick Valley's New Water Reuse Plant

A four-session grade 7 project in which teams build a staffing packet for a fictional water reuse plant, covering six positions, every hour, and every credential.

Objectives

  1. Students will research water-sector roles and name the credential each one requires.
  2. Students will build a staffing plan that meets a stated coverage constraint.
  3. Students will present and defend a staffing recommendation to a fictional board.

Vocabulary

Apprenticeship
A way to learn a skilled job by working alongside experienced workers while getting paid. Water utilities use apprenticeships to train new operators and technicians.

Also: water reuse, coverage, credential, job posting

Teacher overview

Teams answer one driving question across four sessions: who has to be at a water reuse plant, at what hours, with what credentials, for the plant to run safely on the money the board has approved. The project mirrors a decision utilities make whenever they open a new facility, because the schedule has to be covered by the people a utility can actually hire. Each team turns in a staffing packet and presents it to a fictional board in five minutes. The roles in this project include work entered straight out of high school, work entered through a certificate or apprenticeship, and work entered through a degree, and all three keep the plant running.

Staffing Drenwick Valley's New Water Reuse Plant — Grade 7 Careers & CTE
Name: ____________________________ Date: ______________

Project Brief

Driving question. Who staffs a new water reuse plant, and how do six people cover every hour of the week?

The client. The fictional Drenwick Valley Water Authority serves a dry region and has just finished a small water reuse plant. Reuse plants take treated wastewater and clean it further so it can refill groundwater or serve industry. Real facilities of this kind exist and can be large, such as Orange County's Groundwater Replenishment System, which is the largest indirect potable reuse facility at 130 million gallons per day. The fictional Drenwick plant is much smaller.

Why the board is worried. About 10,000 openings for water and wastewater operators are projected each year, on average, from 2025 to 2035, and that count describes operators specifically. Roughly one-third of the water workforce becomes retirement-eligible within the next decade. The board wants a plan it can actually hire against.

Constraints. Every team works under all five of these limits.

  • The board funds exactly six positions.
  • A licensed operator must be on site 24 hours a day, every day of the week.
  • At least one position must be open to someone hired straight out of high school.
  • At least one position must require a certificate, an apprenticeship, or a two-year degree.
  • Every posting must name the credential and say how a person earns it.

The deliverable. Each team turns in a staffing packet containing a role list, a weekly coverage chart, three written job postings, and a one-page training plan. The team then presents the packet to the fictional Drenwick Valley board in five minutes and answers two questions from the board.

Milestones

  1. Session 1: role research. Each team researches five water-sector roles and builds a role list. For each role the list names what the person does, the credential required, and one route to that credential. At least one route must begin right after high school, and at least one must involve a degree. Output: a one-page role list with sources named.
  2. Session 2: coverage chart. The team builds a grid with the days of the week down one side and the hours across the top. The team marks who is on site in each block using only its six positions. The chart must show a licensed operator on site at every hour. Output: a completed coverage chart plus three sentences naming what the team gave up to meet the constraint.
  3. Session 3: job postings. The team writes three of its six postings in full. Each posting states the title, the duties, the credential, how the credential is earned, and the shift. No posting may describe a route as better than another. Output: three finished postings.
  4. Session 4: training plan and board presentation. The team writes a one-page plan for how the fictional Drenwick Valley Authority will grow its own staff, then presents the packet. The plan names two new questions the team could not answer from its sources. Output: the training plan, the five-minute presentation, and answers to two board questions.

From Water for Schools (waterforschools.org). This material is in the public domain (CC0) and may be copied, edited, and shared freely.

Rubric
Criterion Emerging Developing Proficient Advanced
Coverage against the constraint The chart leaves hours uncovered or uses the wrong number of positions. The chart uses six positions but leaves gaps in licensed coverage. Six positions cover every hour with a licensed operator on site. Six positions cover every hour, and the team explains what it traded away to get there.
Roles and credentials Roles are named without credentials. Credentials are named but not the routes to them. Every role names a credential and a route, including one route from high school and one through a degree. Routes are accurate and specific, and the packet treats each route as a full career rather than a fallback.
Research and sources No sources are named. One source is named for the whole packet. Several sources are named, and figures are attributed. Sources are named and compared, and the team states which figures apply to operators specifically.
Presentation to the board The packet is read aloud without organization. The presentation covers some parts of the packet within the time. The five-minute presentation covers the chart, the postings, and the plan, and answers both board questions. The presentation is organized and timed, and the answers to board questions cite the team's own chart or postings.

Differentiation

Support

Give these teams a partly built coverage chart for the fictional Drenwick plant, with two shifts already filled, and a role card deck listing five roles with their credentials already printed. Let the team write two postings rather than three, and allow the presentation to be delivered from a script.

Extension

Ask these teams to add a sixth constraint of their own, such as one position that must be filled by someone who speaks a second language spoken in the fictional Drenwick Valley, and to redo the coverage chart to meet it. They can also write the board's two hardest questions and their answers.

ELL supports

Pre-teach coverage, shift, credential, apprenticeship, and posting with one short definition and one example each, and provide a bilingual glossary card. Allow the role list and coverage chart to be completed in phrases. Provide a presentation frame: "Our plant runs with six people. The licensed operator is on site because ___."

Extensions

Invite a human resources staff member from a nearby utility to review two teams' postings and say which parts a real applicant would find unclear. Teams can then revise one posting and note in a short paragraph what the revision changed and why.