Over the years, Greenbrier East High School has always offered the Careers in Education CTE program as a two-year, double-block class. The first year was an introduction to child development combined with students beginning placement as aides at the preschool located on school grounds. During the second year, students decided whether they wanted to enter the elementary or secondary education path, and from that point, lessons and activities were based upon that chosen track. There was still some interaction with the preschool, but it was limited. During November of the second year, CTE students were placed either at Eastern Greenbrier Middle School or in an area elementary school, where they would fulfill duties assigned by their assigned teacher as well as planning and executing a lesson of their own once a week. At the end of the second year, completers took the National Occupational Competency Testing Institute (NOCTI) exam which, if passed, awarded college credit.
As someone who is a completer of the program, I believe that it is one of the best CTE programs that GEHS has to offer because you gain so much experience with children and build a substantial store of knowledge about how different school districts are funded and operated. For my second year, I decided to do secondary education. I was put in an 8th-grade special education math class. I learned so much about how people who have different brains think and I formed friendships not only with the students, but with my host teacher, Mrs.Carola. By the end of the year, the NOCTI exam rolled around and I passed with flying colors. But something was off with the program.
Our teacher, Ms. Wyatt, told us that we were going to be the last Careers in Education group and that a new program created by the state called Grow Your Own would be the new education program at GEHS. Unlike Careers in Ed, Grow Your Own is a dual enrollment course and the curriculum is completely different from CIE. GYO program has more benefits than CIE; for example, state dollars pay for the dual enrollment courses, because one of the big standards for GYO is that you should graduate high school with the right number of college credit hours to be considered a college sophomore. Once you get to college and begin your student teaching unit, you will have your own classroom, get paid for the student teaching, and be monitored only by a teacher selected by your school. In a way, I feel like I was robbed out of a better teaching path taking Careers In Education just because of the outstanding benefits that Grow Your Own has to offer for its completers.
I spoke with Ms. Wyatt, the teacher who is in charge of GYO, and asked for her opinion about this new program. “I think that Grow Your Own provides a lot of opportunities,” Wyatt said. “Right now, in the state of West Virginia, we have over 1800 teacher vacancies…this program is to encourage students to be interested in this career field and have a little more knowledge. Also, It helps them get started with college because this is a dual credit program.”
When asked if she preferred Grow Your Own over Careers in Education, Wyatt said that there were benefits and drawbacks to both. While she misses some of the classes CIE had, including children’s literature, Wyatt noted that GYO’s track ensures that when you are a senior in college “you will get your own classroom, and you will have a mentor teacher that can help you with things that you aren’t as familiar with, and you are also getting paid [65% of a teacher’s salary] while you are in your student teaching phase” as well as earning benefits earlier. “So, I think this is an amazing opportunity for these students,” Wyatt concluded, “and I wish I had this when I was in high school.”
Mrs. Wyatt also told me that she has hopes that the second-year Grow Your Own students will have the opportunity to visit the majority of local and private elementary schools in the school district instead of a single school, but that has not been determined.
Careers in Education and Grow Your Own are both wonderful programs that have blessed the halls of GEHS. They both have their strong suits, but after my careful consideration, from everything that Mrs. Wyatt has told me, Grow Your Own is the better option and is by far the best replacement for the long-lasting Careers in Education.
