Every school day, senior Brett Murray leaves Rockhurst…to go to class. You read that right. At 11:35 on A days, and 12:05 on B days, Murray gets in his car and makes the 25-minute drive to the Blue Valley School District’s Center for Advanced Professional Studies—CAPS for short.
The CAPS campus, located at 151st and Metcalf, looks to serve students in the district with profession-based learning—a combination of classroom instruction with hands-on work and education from real employers in a variety of industries.
The CAPS program gives Murray real-world experience in the field of sports medicine, an area of interest for him professionally. Additionally, Murray receives college credit through Johnson County Community College.
“I’m thinking about orthopedic surgery, physical therapy, just overall hands-on activity,” Murray said.
Murray, who resides in the Blue Valley School District, learned of the program through word of mouth. After encouragement from his mother, Murray and his family reached out to Mike Wickenhauser, Rockhurst’s assistant principal for academics.
“We’ve had students do the CAPS program before, so that wasn’t completely out of the blue,” Wickenhauser said. “A lot of it is timing…for Brett in this case, it was pretty clean.”
Rockhurst enables Murray to take classes off campus by counting his CAPS classes towards the 28 credits required for graduation. In the time he spends at Rockhurst, Murray takes his core classes–English, math, and theology–as well as government in second semester. With his core classes taken care of in-house, Murray has more freedom to count his CAPS classes as elective credits.
“When it’s an elective credit, it really does give us some freedom,” Wickenhauser said. “If a student wants to do this CAPS class…there’s something gained from that.”
Wickenhauser and the school tailor their approach to each student. When considering whether or not to count external opportunities towards graduation, the academic merits of the outsourced material are considered. Most pre-professional programs like the one Murray attends pass that test.
Wickenhauser used the example of Hawklets who have played for Sporting Kansas City II—the professional reserve, or “minor league,” team for Kansas City’s MLS club—who leave school early as activities that do not qualify for credit. Those students complete online coursework through the Arrupe Virtual Learning Institute, a Jesuit-sponsored online school.
“Soccer doesn’t count as a credit…but some of these pre-professional ones do fit in some of our elective credits,” Wickenhauser said.
While Rockhurst provides a host of academic opportunities for its students, programs like CAPS fall outside what Rockhurst’s current infrastructure can provide. With service to students in mind, Wickenhauser and the rest of the administration hope to expand these opportunities to more students.
“We’d love to expand it. It’s just, do we have the infrastructure to support it?” Wickenhauser said.
Challenges to further integration include the accessibility of the programs: Murray is able to enroll freely in the CAPS program due to his residence within the Blue Valley district. Kansas legislators passed a law in January 2024 requiring school districts to practice open enrollment—allowing students from outside a district to apply for enrollment—although due to size constraints, among other variables, these spots are not guaranteed.
“The accessibility is limited then, to those students, and you’d love to have it open to everybody,” Wickenhauser said.
Murray agrees that more Rockhurst students of all interests would benefit from programs like his.
“It’s not just medicine, they have all kinds of business, finance, anything like that,” Murray said. “I think it’s just great if you want to explore something.”
Wickenhauser is also looking to support students pushing into other pre-professional avenues. Murray’s fellow senior Ethan Guenther holds a renewable internship with Burns & McDonnell, a renowned architecture and engineering firm in Kansas City. Guenther’s experience represents a new venture for Rockhurst.
“It’s probably closer to a pilot, where we’re seeing how it’s gonna work,” Wickenhauser said.
Part of the goal of helping Guenther and potential future Hawklet interns is supplementing their out-of-school experience with in-school support. Guenther has been meeting with Rockhurst teacher Tyler Baker to reflect on and evaluate the professional skills he’s acquiring.
“We’re trying to figure it out, but I wouldn’t be surprised if we offered an internship class as soon as next year, maybe in two years,” Wickenhauser said.
Murray and Guenther are serving as case studies for a potential next wave of opportunities at Rockhurst, as the school looks to best serve their students in new and exciting ways.
