Westfield Academy and Central School Career and Financial Management students take a much broader approach to preparing for their future, as could be seen at the Career Walk of Fame held last week.

The Career and Financial Management class is required for graduation at WACS.

“However, the Career Walk of Fame is a new facet of the class, said Ms. Kimberly Alonge, who teaches the course. “This is the first year I’ve done this for career research and presentations, she said.

Alonge explained that her students have been preparing for their futures by researching careers, attending field trips and talking with professionals in different career areas. Her pupils also prepared for and attended mock interviews on March 6 and 8 with business professionals from the community.

WACS 9th grade student Darien Swanson talks to children from the kindergarten class about his presentation. Submitted photo

Interviews were conducted with such experts as Attorney Cheryl Reed, Brandy Cochrane, owner of Cake by Brandy; Patty Bowen of Westfield Nursery; Chris Cardo, owner of Boxcar Barneys; Activity Director of Absolute Care of Westfield, Hillary Pattison; Travis Heiser, CEO of Inner Lakes Federal Credit Union; and Richie Betts, owner of Betts Insurance Agency. Several faculty members from WACS also conducted mock interviews with the students.

Career Day, however, not only helped pupils consider their career paths, but also served to illustrate that a particular profession might not be a good fit for them.

“Some of the careers they thought they were interested in, after they did the research, they changed their minds,” Alonge said.

Each student was required to prepare a presentation board about a possible career. Each board included a description of the career, education and training required for the job, benefits, a typical day in the life, and the projected future of the career.

Presentation boards were displayed around Ms. Alonge’s classroom and younger students visited at three different presentation times throughout the day on Thursday. “I started out by inviting pre-K through eighth grade ,” Alonge said. “My students got to talk to many younger students.”

Kat Haltiner, who is a senior at WACS, made her presentation on medical imaging, a field she said fits her well. She explained that this profession can take on two different dimensions. It can be used for illustrating surgical procedures or it can be used to animate anatomy at a cellular level, Haltiner said.

“I am an art major, but I’m also really into science,” Haltiner said. “I was looking for a field for a career to incorporate both, and this just popped up,”

Tenth grader Daniel Davies made his presentation on being a chemist. “I was always good at science and this field comes naturally to me,” he said.

Ninth grader Darien Swanson said he didn’t particularly know much about the field of electrical engineering when he decided to research it as a possible career. “I did a presentation on it earlier this year and found it really interested me,” he said.

Other careers on which students gave presentations included such traditional ones as orthodontist, social worker, photographer and baker. Less conventional careers like multi-media artist, software developer, aerospace engineer and cardiothoracic surgeon were also presented by students. Even some unexpected career choices, such as rabbit breeder, game warden, and judge were also researched and presented by the students.

Alonge said her approach is “old school,” that is, the presentations were not electronically created or displayed but consisted of words and pictures pasted on a sign board. The method of presentation, however, is new.

“Instead of standing up here and displaying the board to the class, they get to talk to many people about their career and plans,” Alonge said. “It’s a different way to present information and share their work.”