What’s Right With Our Schools: Catoosa County College and Career Academy

Catoosa County, Ga. (WDEF) – The medical professionals of tomorrow are getting the training they need today at the Catoosa County College and Career Academy. Juniors and seniors from all three county high schools should have good jobs waiting for them upon graduation, or they’ll have a solid head start their further education. All that adds up to a healthy example of what’s right with our schools.

Holly Howell is the Healthcare Science Instructor at CCA.

She says, ” This program is amazing. So, it is for our senior students that come from all three of our high schools here in Catoosa County. They come here, they’re able to get certifications for CNA, medical assistant, phlebotomy, patient care tech, and that way we hand them a certificate after they have completed their exam and passed it, and they can go get a job right after that.”

Grant Wilson is a senior at Heritage High School.

He explains,” This offers a huge opportunity for us as students here. I mean, not only does it give us advantage getting to say, I want to go nursing school or other, getting to, like, she wants to be a surgeon by chance, and it helps you get ahead, I think. Saves around $15,000 to $17,000 worth of schooling.”

Holly Howell is also a senior at Heritage.

Holly says, ” They’re getting the experience in here to know if this is something they want to pursue, if they want to go to college or if they don’t, we’re able to help them get the experience that they need.”

Heritage senior Haley Wyer says, ” The medical field is very broad. It has a lot of different things. It’s a very broad field; a lot of different aspects to it. So, by going ahead and jumping in a little bit, and getting some hands-on experience, we can pinpoint and figure out exactly what we want to do.”

Ringgold High School senior Chloe Mullens says, ” Nurse Holly is a great teacher. She has experience, and it’s just a great program for everyone.”

Ringgold Senior Logan Hill chips in, ” Most classes, you would have to wait until you were out of high school, be 18, and then you could take them, and you’d have to pay a lot of money. You can get here for almost nothing.”

Holly Howell concludes, ” If they’re going to the hospital setting, there is going to be no learning curve from them. They have learned everything they need to know that day one when they start working there, they know what they’re doing. The sky’s the limit for the kids.”