Ms. Elizabeth Carter, a college and career counselor at West Potomac, enjoys helping students find their passion.

“I worked with students since I got out of college in 1982,” she said. “I’ve mostly worked with college students, but I just enjoyed helping young people find and pursuing their passion.”

Carter and her husband enjoy watching sporting events.

“I am a sports fanatic,” she said. “I love sports and I attend a lot of sporting events: football, basketball, baseball and ice hockey. I spend a lot of time at sporting events with my husband.”

She cheers on her favorite football team: her alma mater, Virginia Tech.

“My favorite sport is college football,” she said. “My favorite team would be Virginia Tech–that’s where I went to college, that’s where I met my husband, and I’m actually from that area, so I kind of just grew up with it.”

Carter explains how she met her husband at college.

“He did not play football,” she said. “He was in the commander cadets on a JROTC scholarship and that’s where we met. That’s how I traveled around the world–because he was military.”

But first, she had to finish school as a biology major.

“I was an undergraduate there,” Carter said. “I was actually pre-med. I majored in biology.”

After that, she stayed another year.

“I stayed an extra year at Virginia Tech to pick up my certification to teach high school,” she said. “Believe it or not, I was a high school teacher.”

Her husband was a big factor in Carter’s career switch.

“I taught over in Europe after my husband and I got married, because I knew I was marrying someone in the military and who was going into service,” she said.  “That’s why I stayed an extra year in Tech. Knowing I couldn’t go to med school, I was going to go to get my certification to teach.”

Carter felt she could better aid students if she were a counselor instead of a teacher.

“That’s what sparked my interest: helping students,” she said. “So it went from teaching to counselling.”