Training Future EMTs Online While Covering Traditional College Curricula
By Thomas A. Hennigan, Ph.D.
Lewis-Clark State College
Lewis-Clark State College (LCSC), U.S. News & World Report's third-ranked
public college in the West, offers a broad range of distance learning courses
covering the traditional subjects. The institution, however, is taking eLearning
further than many other institutions with programs that directly address the
region's shortage of health professionals.
Nearly 800 high school students in Idaho and Montana take LCSC's "Fundamentals
For Health Professions" course, gaining exposure to careers as nursing
assistants, first responders and EMTs. These health professions are critical
in a region of the country where miles of barren land often separate the sick
and injured from doctors, hospitals, and emergency services. The school also
offers online certification courses.
The training fills a course accessibility gap for high school students. Only
one out of 22 high schools in North Idaho's Region 2 previously offered the
course, a prerequisite to the emergency medical technician (EMT) and certified
nursing assistant (CNA) courses in the high school curriculum. Other regions
had similar figures with 90 out of 130 high schools having no health occupations
courses. With the development of the WebCT-powered course, all high schools
in Idaho have the option to offer the prerequisite.
"I got started in the WebCT Fundamentals for Health Professions course
in high school," said U.S. Army Pvt. Carol Gilbert from Potlatch, Idaho.
"It helped me know what kind of career I wanted. Now I'm a field-trained
medic in the Army and on my way to Hawaii where I'll get to go to nursing school."
LCSC uses WebCT Campus Edition to power these eLearning programs, as well as
federally sponsored training to campus administrators of Student Support Services
(SSS), Upward Bound and Americorps - programs that are helping area students
move from high school through college. Approximately 200 administrators take
the training every year.
"Since we started using WebCT in 1998, participation in distance learning
from both faculty and students has grown tremendously," said Kathy Martin,
dean for community programs at LCSC. "WebCT has made it easy for us to
adapt our courses for rural and non-traditional students. Nearly 30 percent
of our enrollment is through online course delivery."
LCSC's regular academic program is also thriving with an 80 percent completion
rate for online courses, which is twice the national average. School officials
attribute that success to its dedicated distance learning faculty. In the future,
the school plans to integrate WebCT Campus Edition with its portal and Datatel
student information system.
Idaho's four-year institutions are all tasked with outreach to non-traditional
populations and the state's K-12 students as well. Adopting WebCT for learning
and course management solidified and expanded an already-thriving eLearning
component of that outreach for Lewis-Clark State College.
The key to this success has been combining the right tools with best practices
in the areas of course development and support.
Using a homegrown "(Almost)
Painless Course Design" tool, support staff is able to help faculty define
their learners, learning outcomes, and target instructional methods to meet
their teaching and learning goals. "WebCT 101" gives faculty the experience
of being an online student as they learn how to use the campus learning management
system and related tools. The use of these tools is supported by large-group
and one-on-one training and development sessions with course development support
staff.
Like many institutions, LCSC faces challenges in terms of infrastructure and
facilities scheduling for classes. Currently less than 10 percent of LCSC's
online learning objects support hybrid (blended) courses. The college is anticipating
great expansion in this area in the next three years and will apply the same
solid principles to redesigning courses as hybrids that have succeeded so well
in its solely online courses.
