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Printing Industries of America Announces Education Awards of
Excellence Recipients
Pittsburgh, PA, August 2009—Printing Industries of America
has named the 2009 Education Awards of Excellence academic and industry
recipients, Cheryl Licklider and Charlie Benjamin respectively.
The awards are presented annually to an academic representative and an
industry representative in recognition of outstanding contributions to
education and training in the graphic arts.
Industry Recipient
Charlie Benjamin’s career started in 1972 working for local printers while
still in high school. In 1975 he earned a Vocational Certificate from
Hennepin Technical College in Minnesota before moving to California. Once
in California, he received a Bachelors Degree in Industrial Studies and
his teaching credentials from California State University.
From 1994 to 2001, Mr. Benjamin taught Print Communication at the Western
School of Technology and Environmental Science in Baltimore County, Maryland.
During this time, he continued to work for local printing companies in
order to keep up with printing technology.
It was not until 2001, when he was hired to teach at the Occupational
Skills Training Center, in Baltimore, Maryland, that he found his true
passion. Mr. B, as his students affectionally called him, went from teaching
high school students to teaching inmates. At the Occupational Training
Center, Mr. B teaches work ethic along with entry-level printing to the
inmates during the final months of their sentence. Some of his students
say that he is “the first person to treat them as people, real people,
real students, rather than inmates.”
During his teaching at the Occupational Skills Training Center, Mr. B
convinced his industry peers to join a newly formed printing industry
advisory board for the Maryland prison system and a partnership was born.
The partnership was created to provide ex-offenders with an alternative
to “life on the streets” upon their release from prison.
As a result, Mr. B’s graduates have gone on to work as bindery employees,
press operators, and supervisors. Two previous students of Mr. Benjamin’s
have been featured in a National Public Radio Morning Edition Broadcast
at the recommendation of the Baltimore Mayor’s office. Several other students
have been highlighted by Maryland Public Television and the Baltimore
Sun newspaper. In 2004 Mr. Benjamin’s program was featured in the Maryland
Gazette.
The Education Awards of Excellence was presented on September 12 at the
2009 GASC/Printing Industries of Americas Teacher’s Conference in Chicago,
IL.
For more information about the Education Awards of Excellence, please contact Chrystal Senay at 800-910-4283, ext. 736 or csenay@printing.org.
