Carolyn Brown has taught in her hometown of Muncie, Indiana, for the past two decades.
A proud Delta High School and Ball State University graduate, Brown originally had different plans for where her career would take her.
Her experiences and time with the Muncie Area Career Center (MACC) have been a constant in her journey.
“I feel like [MACC’s] the best-kept secret in Muncie,” she said.
The MACC provided Brown, along with many other students over the years, opportunities to engage in Career and Technical Education (CTE) based learning. According to its website, the center aims to develop the academic and career skills of high school and adult learners via its CTE and free Adult Education (AE) programs.
Director of the MACC Caleb Beasley said the MACC serves more than Delaware County, addressing the “significant needs” of AE in Randolph and Blackford County as well.
“We know that increasing the educational attainment of our population is going to increase economic opportunities for those individuals, but it's also going to increase the economic opportunities that are available to their families, as well as our community's abilities to sustain itself and to grow,” he said.
Beasley has been the director of the career center for the past six years, earning the position while working elsewhere within Muncie Community Schools (MCS). During his time with the center — and through the COVID-19 pandemic — he said it has experienced immense growth in enrollment and general improvements.
He said a large part of why this occurred was the work taking place on the AE side of the center.
The MACC offers three main AE courses: Adult Basic Education classes, which prepare adults for the high school equivalency exam; English as a Second Language classes, which teach learners foundational English skills; and Career Certification classes, which allow adults to improve or gain a certification from a variety of offered career options.
All of this work led to state-wide recognition in October 2024 from the Indiana Department of Workforce Development.
“[Our adult education team was] recognized by our state association as a “Program of Excellence” for adult education, specifically because they met some performance goals that the state has set for us,” Beasley said.
The AE team achieved numerous performance goals, something Beasly said is a reflection of their students and exceeded enrollment goals. Due to the pandemic, Beasly said enrollment was stalemated for some time. He said the growth this year was huge for the center.
Adult educator Kristi Brumley agreed the growth has been “big.” After retiring from teaching middle school at MCS, she returned to work at the MACC and quickly discovered a passion for AE.
“I fell in love with this place just because it's very rewarding to see a person come to you kind of broken. Things just did not go well in school, they don't have confidence,” Brumley said. “… I can't solve all their problems, but we have a lot of resources and a lot of partners that we can turn to, and we also offer flexibility … We’ll meet you, and we’ll get you to the next point.”
Brumley, alongside a team of around 10 co-workers and adult educators, works to provide AE to community members and said they’re all flexible and willing to meet students where they are. For her, this means heading to different locations and facilities, changing her schedule and “flexing” with other team members to make sure students have the help they need.
Brumley said even though the team is “small and nimble,” they’re “strong” and do everything they can to ensure students can succeed.
“It just warms my heart,” Brumley said. “I have fallen in love with the AE program.”
While the AE side of the center has thrived, Beasley said CTE, alongside Brown, at the MACC is not far behind.
Brown came to the MACC as a senior in high school and began taking a CTE course in cosmetology. After working in hair for a few years, she began working in a dental office before taking a position at Monroe Central Elementary School.
That's when she was contacted about an opening for her current position at the MACC, where she said she then launched, developed and began the current dental program curriculum.
The MACC has 13 other CTE programs ranging from carpentry to health sciences. Brown said this variety allows for MACC graduates to be out impacting every part of Muncie.
“[Graduates are] everywhere I go. I’ll be out for on-site observations, and I am running into dental hygienists who came through my program 16-17 years ago. I am running into dental assistants all over the place,” she said.
CTE allows high school students to participate in hands-on learning and programs during their school day. Brown said this ensures kids are experiencing the courses and work they want to — and even earning college credit — while still getting a general education.
She said while the passion she sees within her classroom is surreal, there is still a stigma surrounding CTE, something she hopes to break and work toward exclusively after exiting the teaching field in a few years.
Brown said she hopes community members in the counties served by the MACC know the center's impact is immense.
“I am ready for people to understand we are churning out so many kids [who] are now taking care of your vehicle, taking care of your hair, taking care of your teeth — these young people are everywhere, and they are being churned out from this hallway,” Brown said.
Like Brown and Brumley, Beasley said he shares a passion for the work being done in the MACC. He admitted before entering his position, he was unsure of what exactly CTE was and what it could do for teens.
He said regardless, when stepping into the position, he was “immediately inspired and humbled” to see the work that teachers do on both sides of the center.
“A lot of times, we get students who, in one way or another, traditional school didn't work [for], or maybe isn't working great for them right now,” Beasley said. “What I love about the opportunities we have here is that we have the opportunity to take that young person or take that adult and provide them with something that lights a fire in them that maybe they didn't know could be lit.”
For more information on the MACC, and the courses it offers in AE and CTE, head to the Muncie Area Career Center website.
Contact Trinity Rea via email at trinity.rea@bsu.edu or on X @thetrinityrea.
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