At Griffith High School, students have the option to take specialized classes at the Hammond Area Career Center during the school day to become better prepared for life after high school. At the career center, students can take different immersive learning programs that fit their own interests such as: health careers, auto technology, criminal justice, and dental assisting. Those are just four out of the sixteen different programs students can take. The other twelve courses include: collision and refinishing, computer information technology, construction technology, cosmetology, culinary and pastry arts, early childhood education, electrical engineering, emergency medical services, graphic arts design, multimedia broadcast academy, and welding. Students from all across Northwest Indiana are able to take these different courses and make it part of their daily schedule. The career center’s goal is “to help enhance student’s career and college skills to succeed, adapt to change, and to become life-long learners in an ever- changing global society.” These different courses are great opportunities for students to utilize if they want to go into the medical field, become a dentist, or become a welder. Those are just a few possible professions that these classes specialize in. The career center courses are also a great opportunity for students because their high schools don’t have these specialized classes like the ones at the career center. On January 23, sophomore students interested in taking classes at the career center next school year took a trip to the career center to gather information about the specific courses available to them. Students were introduced to all the different technology they would be using in their particular courses and also all the classrooms they’d be learning in. “I hope to go into the medical field for my career, so taking the health career course at the career center is definitely something I want to pursue, and seeing the classrooms I’ll be working in next school year made me very excited,” said sophomore Alex Cuellar. At the career center, students are able to do hands-on learning projects to work on real-life skills. The construction technology class works on different projects dealing with the newest technology that construction workers work with today. In the auto technology course, students get
the opportunity to work on vehicles in a realistic auto repair shop which will give them experience working on actual cars before they head out into the real world to pursue an auto profession. For the welding course, students will be able to work on actual machines to give them experience when it comes to welding, which will benefit them by giving them experience with the different welding machinery. Only juniors and seniors are able to take classes at the career center, and the courses are worth different amounts of high school credits depending on the type of classes students take. Some programs are also dual credit classes, which count as both high school and college credit. Taking these different programs at the career center introduces certain careers to students to give them a taste of what a specific career field is going to be like and can also help students figure out what they want to major in in college. It could also them figure out what they want to be after they graduate high school. “Taking classes at the career center has prepared me to become a nurse after I graduate high school, and I advise all the underclassmen to take the programs at the career center because it’ll only help them in the future,” said senior Haley Dixon who takes nursing. Taking classes at the career center has many benefits for students and will prepare them for the real-world.