Perry university taking applications for class of 2025

PERRY – Perry University is back and is now accepting applications for the class of 2025 until Thursday, Jan. 16.

Perry University is a government 101 class, which gives an opportunity for residents and business owners to get a behind-the-scenes look at city operations. Communications Director Tabitha Clark said this includes anything from the mayor’s vision to interactive sessions.

The class is a five-week course, each week dedicated to different city departments. This includes public safety; Clark shared at night participants will go to the city’s fire station on Commodore Drive.

Clark shared this is the most interactive session because participants get to wear goggles and ride a golf cart while also dressing up as a firefighter, spray the hose and get on the ladder truck. Other sessions include talking about leisure services, economic development and downtown development.

“This is an opportunity for people who are really interested to see what happens behind the scenes to learn a little bit more about how their government works,” she said.

The program started back in 2017 and was originally called the Your City program. Clark said it laid the foundation for Perry University. When Clark started working for the city in 2019, they decided to rebrand the program and make the sessions more interactive. 

The tagline for the program is “we take government seriously, but we also like to have fun,” which Clark said is their mindset.

“Entertainment and education go hand in hand. So when you’re really getting in there and being interactive during the sessions you learn a lot and you have a great time as well. That’s kind of how its evolved over the past several years,” she said.

This year, the program will raise awareness on volunteer opportunities available in the city. Clark said they have received a lot of questions recently from residents and visitors on how they can be more involved in city operations and events. She shared they are partnering with their tourism branch, Visit Perry, to give out information to participants and the public about how they can get involved and be a bigger part of their local government.

Clark said the main goal of the program is to educate since many may not think about learning their government until it affects them personally or have an interaction. She shared they consider this an opportunity to make ambassadors for the city because there is a lot of misinformation about city operations and the city’s growth.

“We’ve seen this in the past classes that once we educate our participants and we answer those hard questions for them, and we show them why we make decisions the way we do, it creates a better understanding and then they become ambassadors for the community,” she said. “If they hear something that sounds like misinformation they can say, ‘No actually I went through a class where they explained this, and this is why.’”

Clark also said the communications office is not only trying to communicate that but also trying to spread information to residents and business owners. They will then go out and help them spread the good news or help them share why a certain decision was made.

“That kind of helps too with communicating with their neighbors [and] communicating with their friends. It’s just an all-win situation,” she said

Clark shared every year she gets excited when they start Perry University because she likes seeing participants at the first session. She said some people know a few things about city operations but going through the different weeks and interactive sessions she begins to see the light bulbs going off.

“That’s a big success seeing them go from just interested citizens to well informed citizens and that’s what our goal is for this whole program,” she said.

Clark shared they are looking forward to having a lot of fun and giving people an inside look of the city of Perry.

The program only takes up to 15 and as of right now, there are only a couple of spots left. To apply or find out more information, click here.