For some people, the word “futures”
may evoke images of stock market pits crowded with traders gesturing,
scribbling on notepads and yelling numbers related to pork bellies, orange
juice and other global commodities. But
the energy “futures” that ABARTA Energy is investing in are far closer to home
– they involve our local communities, schools, children and our industry.
Because we believe that energy education
is so important, ABARTA Energy has presented Junior Achievement of Western
Pennsylvania (JA) with a donation of $10,000 to enable them to continue their
very successful “Careers in Energy” program, designed to teach middle school
students about different types of energy, the economic and environmental impact
of each, and careers in the industry and related fields. The investment earned ABARTA Energy the JA 2014
Bronze Leadership Circle Award. JA’s
leadership circle includes many other local oil and gas companies, among them
Range Resources.
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ABARTA Energy’s JA Team with Manager
of JA STEM Initiatives Krista Myers
(L to R):
Kathy Flaherty, Krista Myers, Ken Fleeman and Jim Taylor
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Presenting the award to
Jim Taylor on July 11, 2014, JA’s STEM Initiatives Manager, Krista Myers,
stated: “ABARTA Energy was awarded the Bronze Leadership Circle Award in
recognition of their tremendous support of the JA Careers in Energy Program—a
middle grades program that educates students about the energy industry and the
vast opportunities available within the field.”
This year alone, JA’s “Careers in Energy” program served more than 2,000
of our western Pennsylvania students and several hundred in West Virginia. Topics range from the importance of energy in
our everyday lives and benefits and drawbacks of all energy sources, to natural
gas exploration and environmental activism and are covered in the seven lessons
featured in the curriculum. The program
provides a factual foundation of the science, engineering, business and
societal aspects of the petroleum industry, and a peek into the career
opportunities that reflect the current needs of our local, growing energy
economy. Jim Taylor welcomed the invitation to sponsor
this important effort: “We support the
goal of the JA ‘Careers in Energy’ program, educating future generations about
possibilities in the energy industry that promise to bring economic benefits
and certain energy security to Pennsylvanians for decades to come.”
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Junior Achievement Leadership
Circle Award presented to ABARTA Energy for
financial and in-kind support.
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Interested in becoming more
personally involved with the JA mission, Ken Fleeman ventured into the eighth
grade classroom at Burgettstown Area Middle/High School and instructed six
classes. Ken’s lessons for the day focused
on the environmental footprint of our daily activities and the liability of
every energy type, including solar, wind, geothermal and hydrocarbons. The classes viewed an animated film of
horizontal drilling, which led to candid discussions on oilfield practices and
modern frac technology. Although the
lesson was based on the JA-prepared curriculum materials, Ken also drew on his
own expertise and observations, including workplace expectations of employees. From his day in the classroom, Ken is
gratified to know that “we have bright, inquisitive young people who are
interested in the energy industry; the future will be in good hands.”
As part of their JA Energy packets,
each student also receives a bookmark featuring the ABARTA Energy logo on one
side, and the basic geological stratigraphic column on the other. It is a useful tool to note the age of the
various oil and gas producing rocks, their relative depths, their rock types –
and it does a fine job marking a page in a book!
