Students like Maggie Woodley at Gulf Shores High School are finding out early what it’s like to be a teacher.

Woodley, a senior, has wanted to teach elementary school all her life, and after spending a semester and a half in Sara Altmyer’s second grade class at Gulf Shores Elementary, she’s completely sure about her career path.

“I think it has really opened my eyes to what teachers actually do and what they have to deal with,” Woodley said.

Woodley is part of an internship program at Gulf Shores High School. She leaves school every day at noon, and three days a week, she helps in Altmyer’s class. The other two days, she works as a hostess at Bahama Bob’s.

“They absolutely love her, and they all want to work with her,” Altmyer said. “She’s like an extra teacher in here, which is amazing.”

Altmyer taught Woodley in second grade, and she said it’s a fantastic experience to watch one of her students learn how to become an effective teacher.

“Her nature is so shy, but in here, she’s gotten out of that shyness,” Altmyer said. “She’s so bold with the kids and eager to work with any of them, so I’ve watched her shy personality become not so shy as a teacher.”

Woodley said she loves to help the students with reading.

“Sometimes in their book, they don’t know a word, and I’ll tell them, and they’re like, ‘Oh, is that what that means?’” she said. “They’ll just read through it and know what it says, but not what it means.”

Every time one of these teaching moments happens, Woodley said she becomes more and more sure about becoming a teacher.  

“It feels awesome,” she said. “I’ll never forget those moments.”

And Woodley won’t be the only student learning about teaching this way. This year, Gulf Shores High School launched its career academy program, which allows students to choose a career path like education, architecture and construction, culinary, health sciences and several others. The students will take foundation classes in their career path, and in their junior or senior year, they will have the opportunity to complete an internship.

Gulf Shores High School is the only high school in the county that offers 10 different career academies.

This year’s seniors couldn’t go through the entire program, but the internship was offered to them so they wouldn’t miss out on the experience, said Ernie Rosado, principal at Gulf Shores High School.

Altmyer said she’s excited about the education career academy because she believes it will help students decide whether they want to be teachers before they’ve invested in several semesters of college classes.

“Kids who think they want to be teachers, they get in college and once they get in the classroom, they’re like, ‘This is not what I thought it was,’” Altmyer said. “But when they can do it this early, they can see. They’re not going to waste time their freshman year even taking one or two introductory courses.”

Woodley said she’s already learned a lot of the behind-the-scenes requirements of teaching, but it hasn’t swayed her desire to major in elementary education.

“I had no idea they had to grade so many papers,” she said. “There are stacks of papers everyday.”

Woodley will graduate in May of 2013. She plans to attend the University of Alabama, but she said she wants to come back to Gulf Shores to teach.

“I’ve loved living here all my life, and I couldn’t imagine living anywhere else,” Woodley said. “This is a great school system.”