Wednesday, December 13, 2023
Former cement mason graduates from CVTC in accounting
After contemplating a nursing career and working for a local concrete company, Boone Woolsey took a right turn into accounting and hasn’t looked back.
“I’m a pretty tall guy – six foot six – and I knew my back wasn’t going to hold up working a laborious job, and I always liked behind-the-scenes things,” he said.
On Thursday, Woolsey, 28, will graduate from Chippewa Valley Technical College with an associate degree in accounting. Then, he will transition from a part-time intern to a full-time accountant with Chippewa Concrete.
Although nursing differs from construction, which differs from accounting, Woolsey said the transitions from one to the next make sense.
He was interested in acute care as an EMT. He worked in the emergency department because he liked the excitement and was good under pressure. But the excitement faded after a while, and he realized he needed to choose a career that was a better fit for him, which included stability, consistency and better hours for his life at home – a wife and three young boys.
“It’s hard to know exactly what you want to do when you’re young. I started taking courses at CVTC when I was 16,” he said. “I don’t recommend just jumping into something because you might not be sure what you’ll like at that point.”
Woolsey, of Eau Claire, said the transition from working outside with his hands to inside at a desk was easy in some respects and difficult in others.
Because Woolsey worked in the field, he understood the job from start to finish – from order to delivery to payment and everything in between.
“Typically, when things are happening out in the field, you don’t think about what’s happening in the office,” he said. “When a truckload of concrete comes on the job for you to pour, you don’t have to think about getting an invoice back that confirms the truck was actually there. It’s so important to track everything.”
That’s a part of the job that isn’t a struggle. Surprisingly, his challenge is penmanship, he said.
“That’s been the biggest barrier,” he said. “I don’t have terrible handwriting, but the number of notes and deposit slips where you have to jam all these numbers in and everyone is seeing your handwriting all the time – that’s what I would say to people. Work on your penmanship.”
Brenda Catt, one of Woolsey’s accounting instructors, said she has had him in several classes since he began the program, and he’s a hard worker.
“Boone has a solid work ethic and is committed to actively learning and participating,” Catt said. “He takes extra time out of his busy schedule to conduct informal tutor sessions for his classmates and has demonstrated a strong ability to think critically and apply content from prior courses to the current topic.”
