New Haven Job Corps students from several career paths joined more than one million young people nationwide this year to get a taste of the workplace from the professionals shaping it. The students participated once again in the annual Groundhog Job Shadow Day, an initiative held on Groundhog Day across America to engage career-minded young adults in the world of work before they begin their careers. Here are a few of this year’s NHJCC shadowing opportunities:

• NHJCC students visited with Francis Barkyoumb, a Connecticut business owner and entrepreneur, who spoke to them about how he became successful in the marketing field, the obstacles he overcame to get there, proper goal planning and the qualities that make a good employee.

• Ten students, two from each trade, job shadowed at the Connecticut Department of Labor in Wethersfield. Students listened to a motivating panel of DOL executives who spoke of their professional backgrounds and the personal difficulties they overcame to become successful. They defined success as “being fully responsible for one’s own life and the ability to make a comfortable living.”

• NHJCC students shadowed Eric Chamberlain, Plant Health Safeguarding Specialist for the USDA, at his Wallingford, CT, office. Students learned about his job and what the USGA does and got advice on pathways to careers within the agency. They also toured the facility.

• Marcia Hilditch, a specialist with the National Kidney Foundation, met with Certified Nurse Assistant (CNA) students to discuss the work of the Foundation and kidney health. Students learned about how to recognize the warning signs of kidney dysfunction and how to treat patients they may come in contact with in their careers in health occupations.