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The Generous Virginians Project


Helping build a


future workforce Smithfield Foods gives $3 million to its hometown high school


ever made by the company and the big- gest it has ever given to a high school. “Sometimes it’s easy to look away


from the public schools, but our cur- rent CEO, Ken Sullivan, is very much a public-school fan,” Treacy says. He notes that, while grants to colleges are common, cash-strapped public schools often don’t get corporate donations. The donation fulfills a $10 million


Dennis Treacy, the president of the Smithfi eld Foundation, says that the Smithfi eld High donation is the third-largest donation ever made by the company.


capital campaign launched by Isle of Wight County Schools, which will bene- fit Smithfield and Windsor high schools. In addition to the $3 million grant, the school district will take on a $7.9 million loan to develop vocational courses at the high schools. The project is being initiated at a


by Greg Kremer T


he nation’s largest pork processor has made a major donation to a high school in its backyard.


Earlier this year, Smithfield Foods


announced a $3 million gift to Smithfield High School. The town (which has a population of 8,000) has been the com- pany’s home since Smithfield Packing Co. opened there in 1936. Smithfield Foods today has annual revenue of $14 billion. Shuanghui International Holdings Ltd., a Chinese company, acquired it in 2013. “We are looking to show the Isle of


38 JUNE 2017


Wight and Smithfield communities that we are here to stay and that they are an important part of Smithfield Foods,” says Dennis Treacy, president of the Smith- field Foundation. The money will be used to establish


a new Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps (JROTC) field house, a multiuse pavilion and a “makerspace,” which will be used to teach students manufacturing and engineering skills. Treacy says that the Smithfield High donation is the third-largest donation


time when career and technical education is getting more emphasis in Virginia and elsewhere in the U.S. The com- monwealth is working on an overhaul of its high school graduation requirements, which will apply to freshman students in 2018. These requirements have not yet been


finalized, but the Virginia Department of Education (VDOE) must establish multiple paths for students to be ready for college or careers after high school. Those paths could include participation in internships, externships and credentials programs, a major component of CTE. Isle of Wight County Schools


already is planning to allow students to spend more time in CTE classes. The school system eventually plans to imple- ment a new schedule that would allow students to exclusively focus on CTE classes every other week.


Photos by Mark Rhodes


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