Schools/hospital collaborate on health care career education

PPH has been partnering with public secondary schools and colleges since 2004 to educate students about career possibilities in health and create a “pipeline” program that works with students, teachers, and parents to develop mentoring programs, scholarships, and hands-on work experiences, said Brad Wiscons, PPH’s director of heath development.

The program is part of GO-MED (Growing Our Own Medical Employees Development), an initiative aimed at providing a diverse health-care work force while creating career opportunities for youths, primarily in northern San Diego County.

PPH has helped create health-care academies at Mission Hills High School in San Marcos and Ramona High School in San Diego County. A similar academy is expected to open next fall at Valley Center High School in the Escondido Union School District.

PPH is also working with San Pasqual Academy, the first residential education campus in the country that exclusively serves youths in foster care, Wiscons said.

The curriculum for the health-care academies is designed to provide juniors and seniors with basic education in health care, while students gain experience as volunteers in PPH facilities. Some courses allow students to earn college credits.

Students who graduate from high school are offered jobs at various PPH facilities in health-care positions that require little or no additional training.

Students who continue their education at Palomar College or California State University San Marcos may participate in the Clinical Care Extender college internship program. These students will become part of the PPH patient care team and, PPH hopes, they will have a positive image of the hospital system as a future place of employment.

Ramona High School’s academy opened in September with 30 students, and Assistant Principal Mike Gallion said students are “very serious-minded and enthusiastic” about it.

“Almost two-thirds of the students have volunteered for the Red Shirt program, where they go into hospitals and shadow college interns,” he said.

In addition to a $20,000 grant from PPH, the hospital system supplied scrubs for all students at Ramona’s academy. “On Wednesdays, we have career dress day where students can either dress professionally or wear their scrubs, and 80 percent of academy students opt to wear scrubs. They think it’s cool,” said Gallion, who is also the regional occupational program director for the Ramona Unified School District. 

“When academy students go into the nursing program or other various areas, they will already have college credit, saving them some money,” he said.

“It’s kind of like an AP course but it’s more specific to a vocation. When students volunteer or get a job in a clinical setting, for every 90 hours of work they do, they get an additional five credits,” he explained. “Academies and partnerships of this nature are wonderful. It’s win-win for everybody.”

Ramona school board member Luan Rivera, who was president of the California School Boards Association in 2005-06, said she admires PPH for working with public school districts to address the shortage of health career professionals. She said the GO-MED program “offers exciting opportunities for our students to learn high academic skills in a meaningful context as they prepare for future careers.”