It is often said that an educated child can become anything he or she wants to become. It is the role of the guidance counselor to help make that happen, and students in east central Alabama, regardless of their ambitions, have plenty of options. Having campuses of Central Alabama Community College in Talladega and Childersburg and Jefferson State Community College in Pell City has helped make more options available in the area as well.

The presence of the Jeff State campus in Pell City has been “huge” according to Merrill Friday, a guidance counselor at Pell City High School. “I think having it so close means that some people who might not have gone to college otherwise might be able to go.”

“We have a dual enrollment program with them that allows students to earn credit for college English and history classes while they’re still in high school,” Friday continued. “But we do have a very, very large number of number of graduating students applying to college.”

About 40 percent of graduating seniors applied to two-year schools and 35 percent applied to four year schools. Every student that applied to a college was accepted.

Popular areas of study were all over the map. Medicine and other health related fields, especially nursing, scored highly, and construction and welding were popular with male students. Criminal justice, forensic sciences, psychology, drama and business were also popular choices.

Pell City High School also offers intensive programs in manufacturing and nursing which allow students who began the program in ninth grade to graduate with an associates degree or an LPN.

“The county commission surveyed local businesses here,” Friday said, “to find out what they needed from employees. So we started this program a couple of years ago to let people go straight to work after graduation. The manufacturing program was very successful from the start, but the nursing program is a little harder, probably because its more intense than anything they’ve ever done before. When their friends are on spring break, you’re in the lab. So we’re making some adjustments.”

For others who don’t intend to go to college, there are career tech programs at both the Pell City Campus and at Ashville High School. “We have business technology and agriscience here, that’s the biggest one. There are welding classes here and in Ashville, and Ashville also offers cosmetology, heating and air, masonry and automotive.”

Gina Dulaney at Lincoln High School said, without citing the exact figures, about 60 percent of graduates will attend a two or four year school.

“It helps to have Jefferson State, CACC Talladega, Gadsden State and Jacksonville State University all within driving distance,” she said.

Again, the most popular career option was for nursing, especially among female students, according to Dulaney. “And we do have a career tech program in nursing to help them get a head start.”

Career Tech options at Lincoln include computer electronics and construction, with county students from Talladega County Central High School and Munford High School also learning there.

Tina Runyon, a counselor at Childersburg High School, pointed out that most graduates there are also start out at two-year schools, especially “with CACC right next door. They can save money by living at home while going to school.”

Again, anything in the medical field was seen as a good option, as well as careers involving business or computers.

Like Lincoln, Childersburg hosts career tech classes for other schools in the area, including Fayetteville, Winterboro and B.B. Comer. These classes include health science and engineering. All county schools offer business education classes, and all county schools except Winterboro and TCCHS also offer family and consumer science, she added.

Among the available career tech classes, agriscience was also a popular choice here.

According to Sammy Andrews, a counselor at Sylacauga High School, “by far most of the graduating seniors go to CACC for one or two years. About 40 percent go to a two-year school, and another 25 percent go straight to a four year school. The rest pretty much either go straight to work or join the military.”

Of the two-year students, he said it was “a pretty mixed bag” as far as students pursuing academic or vocational degrees.

Again, Sylacauga graduates go on to pursue a wide range of interests, with medical areas including nursing and lab technician being popular favorites. Career technical options include several computer classes and recently launched introductory courses for electricians and machinists. “We started those about two years ago, and we’ve had a good number of students participating, about 20 per year for the last two years. We also have a cooperative program, which used to be called a work program, where the student works while still going to school.” The school has partnered with a wide variety of businesses in this program.

Although the school lacks a career tech program per se, it has partnered with CACC to offer classes in other technical areas. “We don’t have classes in welding or carpentry or things like that,” he explained. “Nothing that would have been called a vocational program at one time.”

Nicole Callahan, counselor at Talladega High School, estimates that 20 to 25 percent of graduates go directly to four-year colleges. “I’d say we have a very small number in vocational schools.”

Nursing and teaching are the most popular option for both boys and girls, she said.

The school offers career technical classes in automotive mechanics and machining (although the teacher for this class recently went to CACC Childersburg, and some students opted to follow him there). “We also have a health occupation program here, since we’ve got so many students interested in the medical field, as nurses and technicians.”