Paradise Valley Campus Overview
The AAEC Paradise Valley (AAEC-PV) campus features an accelerated early college program and unique industry pathways. These two programs give students the opportunity to finish up to 60 college credits (or an AA degree) and gain on the job industry experience while in high school.
Accelerated Early College Program:
The AAEC-PV Campus has a long successful partnership with Paradise Valley Community College (PVCC) and its sister colleges in Maricopa County. A PVCC counselor works with students and AAEC-PV to integrate college classes into the students’ schedule to leverage the early college opportunity. About 25% of AAEC-PV graduates finish the entire AA degree (~60 college credits) before completing high school with other students finishing anywhere from 15 to 40 college credits. AAEC pays for all students’ college tuition!
Industry Pathways
Industry pathways are not extracurricular clubs or activities. They are actual classes that students take for credit.
Veterinarian Science
The vet science program is a 4-year program that starts with Intro to Vet, Animal Anatomy, Animal Diseases, and culminates to a clinical experience in local vet clinics. During clinicals, students will be able to apply their knowledge and medical skills in a real setting with practicing veterinarians. This is a great program for all students looking for a pre-vet/med experience. Students that are in this track will have their college experience customized to take classes to satisfy prerequisite coursework that are required by Vet/Medical schools.
Equine Science
The equine science program is a 2-year program that starts with Equine Science 1/2, Horsemanship, Equine Science 3/4 (Barn management), and culminates in an internship at local barns/equestrian teaching/businesses. In this program students will learn the science of keeping their own horses, train to ride in either Western or English styles, learn the business skills to run a barn, and apply their knowledge in their internship.
Agricultural Science
Agricultural science is a 3–4-year program. All students at AAEC-PV take Agri-Science as their freshmen science class and can explore other areas such as engineering, plant science, and animal science. After which, students take Agribusiness to learn the skills to run a business and finish the program with a 1- or 2-year internship. Students in this program will be eligible to participate in FFA competition and events leading to scholarships, post high school internships, and job opportunities.
Service Dog Training Program
The AAEC service dog training program is a canine education program following a 4-year track. Students take classes to establish advanced working knowledge in canine medicine, anatomy, nutrition, and behavior. Then students move on to canine training techniques, canine learning theory, disability awareness, and detection such as diabetes alerting. Finally, the program culminates in an internship at local dog training facilities. There is a separate selective application process due to the high level of responsibility and demand that goes into training a working dog. Once the dogs have graduated, they are gifted free of charge to veterans, first responders, and other individuals that have served the community with disabilities to be their service dogs.
