“I can do anything a man can do.”
Those words are a mantra Serina Sylvester is living by as she pursues a career in the automotive industry at Capital Region BOCES.
The Heatly/Green Island 11th grade student is following her family into the auto body industry through the Automotive Collision Technology program at the Career and Technical Education Center – Albany Campus.
“My uncles inspired me,” Sylvester said while taking a break from sanding Bondo on a car.
“They worked on auto bodies and they passed away recently, and I want to go into a career like they had,” she added.
Sylvester is one of 33 students enrolled this school year in the program.
Students in the two-year program learn everything from how to repair, restore and customize cars and trucks to how to mix specific colors and paint vehicles, detail vehicles and calculate finishing costs. 
Sylvester is one of a handful of women students who have enrolled in the program in recent years; less than 3% of the 123,000 workers in the industry are women according to a DATA USA report.
“I like cars and working on them,” she said. “It’s just something that inspires me.”
Automotive Collision Technology is one of 28 programs —covering careers ranging from welding to cosmetology, video game design to nurse assistant—offered by the Capital Region BOCES Career & Technical Education Center on its Albany and Schoharie Campuses.
Follow this link for more information on the program.