Casey Smith comes from an oversized family, which has helped her take on an oversized job for a high school senior.

Smith is the daughter of Alice and Harold Smith. She has seven brothers named Steven, Mark, Thomas, James, Daniel, Paul and Nathan. She has one sister, Mary and one half sister, Barb. Smith has two late half brothers, Chad and Gary. Smith grew up most of her life in Westport. She lived in Columbus for a couple months until moving back to Westport. Now she resides in Greensburg.

Smith is a senior at South Decatur High School. She is in the Interdisciplinary Cooperative Education (ICE) program. This means she goes to school the first half of the day and work the second half on into the evening. Several seniors from both South and North participate in ICE. It is worth three high school credits. South Decatur students meet every Wednesday for workbook assignments relating to the world of work.

“I’ve taken most of the classes I needed to graduate. Instead of taking pointless classes, I took ICE. ICE is great because it helps me make more money than if I went to school the whole day. I enjoy getting out of school after half a day,” Smith said of the ICE program led by Andy Honeycutt, a guidance counselor at South Decatur High School.

Smith is employed at the Decatur County Memorial Hospital and Subway. She works at the Subway by Marathon and Great Clips once a week. However, she almost works a full 40-hour week at DCMH, working five days of the seven. She started work at the hospital a little before Halloween after Honeycutt got her an interview for the position.

“The hardest part of my job at DCMH is probably when there’s too many things to get done and not enough time to do it all. The tasks I do aren’t hard, but they are just time consuming. My favorite part is just being in the hospital and getting along with the people I work with,” she stated the ups and downs of working at DCMH.

She works in the pharmacy department of the hospital, gathering and delivering medicine throughout the different departments of the hospital on a regular basis. She also separates medicine into various kits such as crash carts, anesthesia, EMS and much more. Smith did not need any special training except on the job training. She is considered a pharmacy clerk, whereas pharmacy technicians have to be certified.

At the end of every month, she and the pharmacists check the Pyxis MedStation to make sure it has the correct number of each medicine and that none of the medicine has expired. The Pyxis MedStation has a fingerprint scanner, which means Smith is the only high school senior who will be opening its drawers.

“ICE has helped me learn how to balance school and work,” Smith commented.

She plans to be a registered nurse after college, which working at the hospital her senior year will give her a boost toward. She thinks she will go to Ball State.

Besides delivering medicines and dealing with seven brothers, Smith manages to find time to hang out with her friends at random parking lots when the weather is nicer and visiting at their houses when it is cold.