This is a story of pride, perseverance and accomplishment for Anderson Valley High School Senior German Ochoa. Like all seniors German needed to pick a Senior Project. When he spoke with his teacher Jill Rathe about his plans to possibly do a ride-along with law enforcement she steered him toward a Fire Service Training Program in Wildland Firefighting sponsored by the Mendocino County Office of Education Career Technical Education and Cal-Fire. Far from being a vague idea for a project this program was going to start November 9th and it was going to be demanding. To give you an idea of how demanding, the Senior Project requires a minimum of 15 hours of logged time, German estimates that he has logged on about 200 hours so far! I am looking at the brochure for the program. It reads; “What is the Basic Wild-land Firefighter Training Program? It is an entry-level MCOE/Career Technical Education course offered in partnership with Cal-Fire to prepare students for a career in the public service sector.” 70 people applied, 30 were accepted and 21 got their certificates of completion. In the photo of their graduation we see German the third from the left standing very tall. The entire class trimmed their hair close for the occasion. Jill Rathe was in the audience in Willits to applaud German’s success, she told me bagpipes were played and you can hardly beat that for a ceremonial occasion.
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