TAMPA, Fla. — High schools across Tampa Bay are adding new Advanced Placement courses in cybersecurity and business this year through the AP Career Kickstart program.
The program is an effort designed to connect high school coursework with real-world job skills. At Jesuit High School, more than 100 students are enrolled in the new elective, AP Business with Personal Finance.
Senior Bryce Besece said he is looking forward to taking the course.
“I feel this is a class that’s going to give me the fundamentals and the background to go succeed as soon as I can get into college,” Besece said.
David O’Sullivan, Jesuit’s Math Department chair, is teaching the class. Before becoming an educator, O’Sullivan spent nearly 15 years in accounting. It’s one of the subjects he will be teaching as part of AP Business with Personal Finance.
“It’s accounting, it’s finance, it’s marketing, it’s management, entrepreneurship,” O’Sullivan said. “If a student, junior or senior, is considering business, any kind of business, marketing or management, it’s going to let them dip their toe in the water and get a taste of it, a flavor and say, ‘Yes, this is something that I think I may enjoy or I want to get in a different direction.’”
According to the College Board, business is the most popular major in college, but only 20% of students take a business course in high school. The AP Business with Personal Finance course was created as part of the AP Career Kickstart program to help address that gap.
O’Sullivan said the class is not only for students planning to major in business. He said it will also cover practical financial topics students can use after high school.
“We need people to understand how credit works, loans, because students are going to leave college with student loans. How do they manage that, why you don’t want to pay the minimum on your credit card, because you’ll be paying it forever,” O’Sullivan said.
Besece said he could have chosen an easier elective for his senior year, but he wants to learn financial skills that will help prepare him for his career as well as life after high school.
Brian Hoover, the district’s director of accelerated magnet programs, said AP Cybersecurity will also be offered at eight schools across the county, with nearly 200 students already enrolled.
Leave a comment