Jun. 18—HENDERSON — Graduations are often marked by a mix of reflection and foretelling.

As the name of the Turning Point Community Development Corp.'s workforce development program indicates, the irony of Thursday's The Launchpad graduation ceremony is that the focus was almost entirely on the future.

The eight Launchpad program graduates, all area high school students, are only beginning their educational journeys. The one-week Turning Point CDC training initiative helped prepare them for their summer internships, thereby launching them into the workforce, albeit for a limited period.

"I believe this internship will help me in many different ways," graduate Calvin Kinyon said, addressing the Oasis of Hope Ministries gallery, "like preparing me for a real job and making positive connections with people."

A Vance County Early College junior, the soon-to-be Vance County Cooperative Extension intern signed up to be a speaker for Thursday's ceremony on day one of the program despite feeling hesitant about public speaking. Kinyon wanted to push himself and venture outside of his comfort zone.

Lessons like that can't be quantified.

"This is kind of like a jumping-off point for them for getting into the workforce," said Chandra Sledge Mathias, the Launchpad program facilitator, " and just learning about professional etiquette and work skills, communication skills, leadership skills, team building, the whole nine. All of the basics that you need in the workforce."

Kinyon was joined in the class by Zamir Davis, Dylan Dees, Jaequan Gonzalez, Devin Isom, J'Lynn Isom, Tashad Kearney, and Noah Williams.

Chalis Sledge Henderson usually leads the Launchpad program, but is on maternity leave, so Mathias subbed into familiar territory.

Mathias, a 1996 Warren County High graduate, lives and works in Chicago and around the Midwest as a coach for school principals.

"I just love teenagers," Mathias said. "I was a former high school teacher and principal so teenagers are my jam. If you put me in a room with teenagers anywhere, that's like my comfort zone."

Mathias embraced each of the graduate's personality styles, from Tashad Kearney's flash — he wore a silver-colored suit to the ceremony — to Kinyon's identity as a "silent assassin."

Graduate J'Lynn Isom also took a turn at the mic, highlighting a quote that stuck with her from when the Launchpad group heard from Brandon Tyson, the chief of staff for Boeing Defensive Space and Security Information Technology and Product Systems. The virtual session with Tyson was called "The Power of Networking and Maximizing Internships" and Tyson told them, "You don't know what you don't know until you know it."

Or something to that effect.

"That stuck with me because, like, I don't know everything," said J'Lynn, a Warrenton native and KIPP Pride High student who will intern with Henderson's Creating Success Education Center. "I think I know everything until I put myself in a situation where I'm able to learn new things."

Essentially, that was the message of featured speaker Jerry Edmonds III, Vance-Granville Community College's vice president, who was introduced Thursday by Launchpad graduate Devin Isom.

Edmonds laid out for the graduates the timeline of his professional career, beginning with his very first job mowing lawns as a kid in Beckley, West Virginia.

Raised by his grandparents, Edmonds went from cutting grass and handling frozen fish at a Long John Silver's to an internship with IBM as a Marshall University Student.

The internship turned into a nine-year career before Edmonds put in more than two decades in sales and management for Johnson and Johnson, retiring at 55 before a post-retirement calling to higher education that included earning a doctoral degree in educational leadership.

Edmonds analyzed the age-old question: What do you want to be when you grow up?

"It will never be a straight line to that career," Edmonds told the graduates. "It will always come with zigs and zags and setbacks and moving forward and stepping backward."

Edmonds assured the graduates that they were on the right track and encouraged them to stay there by seeking out supportive networks of likeminded people, people that truly had their best interests at heart.

Throughout the course of the week, the graduates learned about financial literacy, the importance of mentorships and even got to pick the brain of a Google executive in South Africa.

Consider them launched.

"Having a career that you love and are passionate about is doable," Mathias said. "You may not have all the pieces to the puzzle worked out about how do I get there, but what we wanted them to learn this week was you make the connections, you learn the skills and you just enjoy the journey along the way. Each stop you should be learning something that will help you get hopefully where you want to be."