Twelve students this year are making their way into the world, ready for whatever the medical community wants to throw at them.

In 2000, Alamogordo High School began looking at career clusters course planning beginning at the freshman level and resulting in career-level knowledge and even certification for the graduating senior.

The first of these clusters put in place involves health sciences, and 12 students are graduating from that group this year.

The four-year program starts at in ninth grade with an introduction into health careers, said Holly Bird, mentor for the program. The students get to hear from various health professionals about what kinds of careers are available to them. As sophomores, the students learn CPR and first aid.

At the junior level, the path takes the health sciences students into college-level credits for classes like applied human biology, Bird said.

As seniors, students get into medical technology and are trained and certified as emergency medical technicians.

"This is the first level of certification," Bird said. "They have the opportunity to become EMT basics and certified nursing assistants.

"These students work in the community to get cooperative experiences," Bird said. "They actually work with the patients, under supervision, of course."

This year, there are more than 100 students in the program overall, Bird said. Some of her previous students are helping to train this year's seniors.

"We are also working with the Department of Health and Region 2 EMS," Bird said.

The program has been so successful, Bird said, the program received a grant to begin a statewide pilot project next year in five schools across New Mexico.

"We are going to put a developed curriculum into several schools," she said. "We have a grant for the teachers to come here and train over the summer. In New Mexico, we need this emergency response capability."

The students receive community emergency response certification, Bird said. Some of the program's graduates elected to do the extra work involved in receiving the EMT basic certification.

"We got to do a ride-along," student Krista Sinatra said. "We were using the skills we got to apply."

Each of the six EMT basic students got to ride along with American Medical Response ambulance personnel for two 12-hour shifts. They did whatever they needed to for their patients, including CPR. Sinatra had to do CPR on a dying person.

"It was crazy in there," she said of the ambulance. "You just keep working (patients) until the doctor says stop."

The students worked with fall victims, heart attacks, overdoses and people threatening to commit suicide.

"It was an awesome experience," Sinatra said.

"They let us be in charge of the patients," said another student, Rebecca Padilla. "They were watching to make sure."

Padilla had nine emergency calls in her 24 hours of clinicals; Sinatra ended up with 16 calls.

Not only did the students do clinicals with ambulance staff, they also worked at the Casa Arena Blanca nursing home.

The students did everything the certified nursing assistants at the home did, including giving people showers, combing hair, making beds, helping people to the bathroom and providing water and snacks.

"Talking is the best part," Padilla said. "Hearing the stories and listening to what they have to say."

New Mexico State University-Alamogordo's Cynthia Osborne is also an integral part of the AHS program. She teaches college-level, dual-credit courses at the high school for health sciences.

Osborne is an instructor at NMSU-A, teaches the dual-credit courses and volunteers for the Burro Flats fire department.

"We decided to do this (certify EMT basics) for a couple of reasons," she said. "There is a large need for responders all over the state. Students came back and told us if they had been certified as basics, they could have had jobs where they go to college."

The experience of pre-hospital care for the students is good for the students who are bound for medical fields, Osborne said. The students get a wide variety of experience that way.

"Just having that exposure will give them an experience edge," she said. "These people are seldom thanked. You have to find pride in what you do. It is not to everybody's taste."

Osborne's course also addresses the practical issues of how to be safe as a first responder. She teaches how to enter a home and how to leave; that it is not worth going into a place if it's not safe; and not go get close to a person who might not be safe.

"A lot of what we do is critical thinking," Osborne said. "It (an emergency situation) is never what you think."

Of the 12 graduating seniors, six elected not to go for the EMT basic certification but will still receive certification as certified nursing assistants. Even these students are already saving lives.

Kattie Dean saved her father's life during dinner one day.

"It was a normal day at home," Dean said. "He jumped out of his chair and was throwing up. I beat him to the trash can and he was gasping for air, but couldn't get any."

With the third thrust of the Heimlich maneuver, the piece of chicken popped out, she said.

"It was a scary thing," she said. "I was shaking for four hours. It was a good thing we took this class. People die from choking all the time."

Dean plans to be a nurse practitioner for oncology.

"I have a passion for patients," she said.

All of the members of the graduating class have a passion for what they are planning to do as they talk excitedly of going into neonatal work, becoming doctors, working as a forensic pathologist and continuing in the EMT field. They are ready to move into the world as the next generation's health care specialists.