The Kent Career Tech Center, KCTC, is a tech school that provides students with learning opportunities that will help them prepare for their future careers. The classes taken at KCTC can help students get certifications, internships, apprenticeships, and technical training to get themselves ready for the jobs that they want to do in the future. High school students still attend their high schools, but for a couple of hours every day, they are on the KCTC campus learning about their future jobs.
The core values at KCTC provide experiencing relevant core content, challenging and developing thinking skills, inspiring creativity, developing the ability to use technology, developing leadership skills, bettering communication and collaboration skills, introducing interactions with industry professionals, and connecting the classes with post-secondary education.
High school juniors and seniors from all schools in the Kent and Barry County areas for public, private, and home-schooled students attend KCTC. KCTC has around 30 tailored programs to offer students interested in looking ahead in their careers and getting prepared. There are courses in engineering, manufacturing, industrial technology, business, management, marketing, technology, arts, communications, human services, natural resources, agriscience, and health services.
Senior Kendall Gleason is a part of the pharmacy technician program at KCTC due to her desire to one day become a certified pharmacist.
“I joined KCTC because I want to be a pharmacist in the future,” Kendall said. “I thought that it would be a good way to get me ready for that career. I like getting out of traditional school early and going over to KCTC to learn about my future career.”
A few of the topics covered in the pharmacy technician course are medical terminology, drug classifications, drug regulation and control, prescriptions, basic biopharmaceutics, patient safety, and biomedical ethics.
“KCTC is a good way to learn more about a career you may be interested in,” Kendall said. “It is a career tech center where you learn about real-world jobs. You can get internships for jobs at the end of the year, and you can take exams. I’m taking this national certification exam for pharmacy, and I’ll become a certified pharmacy technician if I pass, which is pretty cool. It gives me a little head start in my future career.”
Looking ahead, senior Alayna Gschwind is taking a sweeter route in her career.
“[The course] I take is Advanced Baking and Pastry,” Alayna said. “[I joined] KCTC to expand my culinary knowledge. KCTC has a lot of benefits and helps get you so far ahead in your career.”
The Kent Career Tech Center has ties to Baker College, Davenport University, Grand Rapids Community College, and Ferris State University. Those ties can help students earn college credits for courses taken at KCTC. Getting a jump start in college is one of KCTC’s main goals to help students reach their career goals.
“Say if I were to go to college, it is connected with so many different colleges like Baker College and Grand Rapids Community College,” Alayna said. “There are a bunch of college courses that you can take through KCTC, so if I were to go to one of those colleges, I would only have to go for one year rather than two because I would already know a lot of the things that they would be teaching me the first year.”
Senior Mary Holtgrieve dreams of one day being a nurse, so she joined KCTC as a junior.
“The program I do is called Nurse and Patient Care Tech,” Mary said. “I chose it because I want to work as a nurse when I get older, and it has a lot of great opportunities that come with the class like two internships, a certification exam, and a lot of clinical work.”
In the nurse and patient care program, Mary and the other students are being prepared to work in a hospital setting, working towards the opportunity to earn national certification as a nurse technician or patient care technician and earning college credit.
“In my class, we are doing a lot of the dirty work because we’re the ‘new people,’” Mary said. “We’re also learning how to admit patients, infection control, patient care and comfort, and things like that. Right now, we’re learning about diversity, equity, equality, and how you should treat a patient. It is focused on how you act toward your patient and what to do, [as well as] the knowledge you need to know when you’re in a hospital.”
Participating in KCTC is something that Mary will never regret doing. It’s a nice break from traditional school, but one thing that Mary says is a misunderstanding is that KCTC is still a school.
People often tell her that she is lucky that she gets to leave school early, but she is just leaving school to go to another school. It is not a traditional school, but there is a great deal of learning that goes on, just not in that six-period way. Students go to KCTC to get further ahead in their education to set them up for a brighter future.
“I don’t think that I could go back to a six-period school day,” Mary said. “It’s nice to leave and have a good 30 minutes [before going to KCTC] where you don’t have to focus on school and have a brain break. You could listen to music in the car or bus; it’s nice to leave and have a change of pace. One thing that is misunderstood is that it is a school, and you are going to have class. Some people tell me that I’m lucky to leave, but I’m leaving to go to a different school.”
The Kent Career Tech Center is a work-based learning environment for students to learn the responsibilities of the career they want to pursue. It helps them learn how to be employable in that field of work and learn the necessary skills for that job. Getting college credits and certifications are attractive outcomes that help students thrive and be motivated to work hard in school so that they can be successful in a job.
“Be prepared for the workload for the workload of two separate high schools,” Mary said. “Yes, [KCTC] is fun and is something that you are interested in, but at the same time, you are going to two separate high schools. If you are interested in going to KCTC, fully participating in class, and doing the work, that is the way that you will know that [that career] is the right path for you. That’s my biggest piece of advice”
