In more than one sense, Mo Reed is going the distance and in for the long haul.

The recent Whitney M. Young Jr. Job Corps Center graduate has just completed the concrete trade – and now he’s going on to advanced training to pick up a Class A CDL and take a job as an over-the-road trucker.

The idea of being a trucker is a little bit of a family business for Reed – first as a fallback, and now as a first choice. And when he saw that he could earn his Class A through Job Corps, Reed realized that a free option was a fantastic opportunity for him.

“It’s been around me my whole life,” Reed said. “My grandpa was a trucker, making really good money during the recession in 2008. He retired in 2011 at $30-plus an hour.”

Not only did he grow up with family in the business, one of his early jobs set him behind the wheel.

“Straight out of high school, I worked at a place called Ohio Valley Aluminum. Basically, I dumped the trailers that had the scrap aluminum in them,” Reed said. “My grandpa…helped me with our own personal trailer at home to learn how to back.”

Reed said Job Corps was one of his last chances – failure, as he explained it, wasn’t an option.

“I was lost. I fell into a dark path of a bunch of vices…I went from working every day to maybe showing up, maybe not showing up. I eventually quit working period,” he said. “I decided I wanted more.”

Reed became interested in Job Corps not long before the pandemic shut down admissions and was forced to wait to gain admission to the program. But that wait served only to motivate him to succeed.

“When I finally did get here, it was like failure is not an option now,” he said.

And between his own motivation and help from the staff, Reed managed to make it through – and even thrived, taking up a position as a dorm leader and serving as a mentor for his fellow students.

“I’m not going to say it was easy, but I was set up pretty well,” he said. “The staff was a major part of holding me intact and showing me how I can be a better leader and take charge of my own life. A lot of it was self-motivation, but I do have to give the staff and a lot of students a lot of credit.”

He gave a special shout-out to his closest friend, Logan Wallace, who graduated shortly before he did.

After he earns his CDL, Reed hopes to build his credit up driving over the road for a bit before possibly taking up a route closer to home so he can buy his own home.