By Dylan Deprey
Former WI State Senator (6th Senate District) Gary R. George, Cristol Rey Student Council President McKenzie Billups and Sen. Lena Taylor during a Cristol Rey information session. (Photo by Dylan Deprey)
At 14-years-old, what job wouldn’t a high schooler take for some extra cash on the weekend?
Burger flipper, grocery bagger, theater usher, retail cashier, amusement park worker and dishwasher are just some of the few part-time jobs high school students punch the clock for, whether it is to pay their cellphone bill or putting gas in the car.
It is not every day that a student lands a job working in a corporate environment like in the Bucks front office or Northwestern Mutual to learn skills that could skyrocket their potential, especially if they are dedicated in building a career.
Cristo Rey Jesuit High School, in West Milwaukee, is in its second year and provides students the opportunity to prepare for college and the workplace.
Cristo Rey Jesuit sits in the shadow of Miller Park, and is part of the 32-school networks that serve 10,000 students across the United States. The first Cristo Rey school was created back in 1996 to help students in south side Chicago pay for a quality education that would segue into college preparedness.
Students attend school on an extended schedule for four days a week, and the other day students are bussed to work a full eight-hour day with a work place study partner. These include businesses like Associated Bank, Aurora Healthcare, Manpower- Group and many others.
“The theory of the classroom gets applied because you have to pass the math test today, because tomorrow you are using it while working at BMO Harris,” said Fr. Bill Johnson, Cristo Rey Vice President of Strategic Growth
Cristo Rey Jesuit President Andrew Stith witnessed three senior classes successfully work their way through the Kansas City Cristo Rey High School when he helped build it from the ground up, and saw Milwaukee’s potential.
“Part of my motivation to come here was that I saw what it did for the community and students in Kansas City,” Stith said.
After a Stith conducted a 21-month feasibility study for the school’s need in the community, Cristo Rey Jesuit opened its doors in 2014.
Billups talks to Taylor about his duties for the Bucks during his Cristol Rey workplace study. (Photo by Dylan Deprey)
After two years, 50 corporate work study partners and a freshman and sophomore class of 234 students, Cristo Rey has prided itself in its rigorous class work, building student to business networking and providing a positive education in a Catholic setting.
As Marnele Billups watched his son finishing his 8th Grade year at Milwaukee College Prep, Cristo Rey was number four on their list of potential high school prospects. Having been accepted to a school where he would have been the only Black student, McKenzie Billups and his father decided for him to attend Cristo Rey.
Billups said that at first he had doubts.
“I thought to myself, ‘how is my child going to excel academically and has to work to help pay for his tuition,” Billups said.
Now three months into his freshman year at Cristo Rey, McKenzie Billups was voted Student Council President and was “drafted” to work in community outreach at Bucks, and is even on a fi rst name basis with Bucks Owner Peter Feigin.
Billups was impressed with the work McKenzie was doing with the Bucks as a student employee.
“He wasn’t answering phones. He wasn’t cleaning the bathrooms. This is a position where he is on team assignments doing community outreach and public relations,” Billups said.
McKenzie Billups said that balancing the work can be tough, but there are resources for students to stay on track and even catch up if they have to.
“We have had students one, two maybe three grades behind. So, our philosophy is if they come we will stick with them,” Stith said.
Stith added that as a college prep school, diversity is key to emulating the college learning environment. With a 90 percent, Hispanic population, Cristo Rey is looking for students of all races, ethnicities and religions to make up their incoming Freshman class for 2017.
“We feel that to be a college- prep school you need to go to a school where people grew up in different places and have different thoughts,” Stith said.
Billups said that during the last three months at Cristo Rey that along with the work experience with the Bucks, at school he has felt little social pressure to show off or be anything other than himself.
“It’s like a big family where everybody loves each other and if you need help they will set you up with extra help,” Billups said.