The Project Me logo, courtesy of the Bowling Green Independent School District. .

A new online tool rolling out in the Bowling Green Independent School District will allow students to start charting a course for college or a career as early as the sixth grade.

The district’s new Project Me initiative aims to help students plan for careers more efficiently by giving them access to the Infinite Campus Multi-Year Academic Planner.

The tool allows students to pick a path toward a high school diploma and view year-by-year courses toward that goal, among other functions, according to the district.

Elisa Beth Brown, the district’s director of instructional programs, said the Multi-Year Academic Planner is about more than just scheduling and plotting out coursework, however.

“It’s going to be a place where students can track goals, not only on future career efforts, but how their academics progress toward future life goals as well as a social emotional component,” she said, referring to an aspect of the program that helps students grow personally, not just academically.

The larger Project Me initiative is a revamp of the district’s Individual Learning Plan program, which each student is required by the state to complete.

Previously, Brown said many in the district didn’t feel much ownership over the state’s mandate. However, with the new Project Me initiative, stakeholders feel they’ve created something meaningful for students “because it’s going to be aligned to their personal goals,” Brown said.

The planner tool gets students asking questions about what they want out of life after high school. Even if a student only plans to pursue a two-year degree, for example, Brown said it gets students thinking about what high school courses could align with that goal.

Students will begin with the Project Me program this spring with grade-level advising. Freshmen at Bowling Green High School will complete personality profiles; sophomores will take a career interest inventory and interpret their results; and juniors and seniors will complete career profiles, according to a news release from the district. All students will evaluate their transcripts and do self-evaluations at the end of every school year.

Brown said students between the sixth and eighth grades will begin exploring careers through research and developing self-awareness of what they want out of their education.

Each grade level will have age-appropriate expectations of what kind of progress they should be making under the Project Me program, Brown said, but the students have the freedom to set their own goals.

Additionally, student files, evidence of activities and evaluations will be stored in Project Me folders for each student in the district’s Google Drive, the release said.

The folders are shared with grade-level counselors, and in the future, counselors hope to expand Project Me to include transition activities in the fifth and eighth grades, the release said.

Through the program, Brown said she hopes students realize that life after high school can be planned for and that “we’re going to help you do that.”