SPRINGDALE, Ark. (KNWA/KFTA) — Dozens of adults are on their way to earning their high school diploma this year.

A class full of high schoolers started a new school year, but they are not teenagers.

“This is important. I need to be proud of myself and I wasn’t,” Goodwill Excell Center student Shannan Brink said.

Brink is a grandma to 16.

“The importance of it is to set an example for my grandchildren,” she said.

“This was my last chance to get my high school diploma. I tried six times to get my GED but I didn’t get anywhere.”

Goodwill’s new Excell Center in Northwest Arkansas is giving her another shot.

“It is a journey. It doesn’t matter if you failed school or school failed you. This is an opportunity for adults in the state to realize that dream of earning their high school diploma and what it can do and what doors it can unlock for them,” Goodwill Industries of Arkansas President and CEO Brian Marsh said.

Dozens have already signed up and there is enough space to enroll more than 300 students at a time. It offers high school degrees but also is a licensed trade school.

“This is critical. We have over 300,000 Arkansans that are above the age of 25 without a high school diploma,” Marsh said.

40,000 of those are in Washington and Benton Counties.

“I struggle every day. I can’t just go out and get a job at what I want to do,” Brink said.

But that will change soon change, for Brink and her grandchildren

“When I get home, she’s beside me doing my homework with me. She’s 7 and that’s huge,” Brink said.

She is already teaching her grandkids the importance of an education.

To learn more about the Excell Center, click here.