Cedar Valley CAPS programs helping students hone skills, career interests
FROM THE WATERLOO-CEDAR FALLS COURIER (12/26/21) CEDAR FALLS — Ethan Wiechmann didn’t have much time to decide when he was asked to lead a new career program at Cedar Falls High School. In less than two months, the Center for Advanced Professional Studies would begin its first semester and the math teacher would need to get up to speed on the program. “I really didn’t know what CAPS was,” he admitted in a recent interview. But two days later, on Dec. 7, 2016, during a meeting with Cedar Falls Community Schools’ administrators and Board of Education members, he was introduced to Nate Clayberg. Clayberg, who operated a business solutions firm and had also been asked to assist with CAPS, discussed the challenges of getting companies and schools to work well together. Wiechmann recalls thinking, “this is definitely something that’s worth looking at” and signed on to the effort. It was “two weeks to Christmas break and a month (of school being in session) before this thing