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On Wednesday, April 5th in Mrs. Maisner’s freshman World Geography class, several members of all of Avonworth’s “Career Academies” served as a panel to discuss their experiences in the newly-named Personal Pathways program. The class- long discussion and Q&A represented all of the Pathways: Business, Finance, and Entrepreneurship, the Innovative Arts and Communications, the Public and International Relations, the Health and Medicine, and the STEM Career Academies.
Each of the respective academies provided a member or two that spoke to the group of eager Freshman about possible opportunities through the next three years of their high school careers. For example, the Innovative Arts and Communications Academy representatives explained how their academy offered internship opportunities in the specific art fields they are looking into for their future, with senior Sarah Ward describing her experience of job shadowing a wedding planner and makeup-artist. Senior and member of the Public and International Relations Career Academy, Anna Wagner mentioned, “I thought it was interesting to talk about my experiences and kind of be like, oh, yeah, I did a ton of stuff with this program, which isn’t really a realization you have while you’re doing it until you look back onto your experiences.”
“So is it only field trips?”asked Freshman Donny Baxter. The representatives went on to explain that this program is more about gaining experience in the field that you are interested in. “You’re in high school and want just as much exposure as you can,” says Senior Innovative Arts and Communications Career Academy member, Anders Ove. “Even if you have slight interest in it [a topic that a career academy covers], might as well get some slight exposure in it.”
This panel in was put together by Mrs. Maisner in the first place to generate interest for this program in the upcoming freshman class, and she has high hopes for the future of the Personal Pathways experience as it grows and becomes more organized moving into the future. “I am very excited about Career Academies next year because I feel as if the strides that we’ve made have put together a good structure that will allow students to really get great experiences,” mentions Maisner. “Not that we weren’t doing well in the past, but from the students that were present, I think they already saw how those changes have affected and impacted their growth, and I only think it’s going to get better with each coming year.”
