Online high school course paving the way for career in healthcare
January 20, 2023
High school students are gaining early experience and getting the chance to enter the healthcare field before they even graduate. This is happening in LinK12 Lakeville’s online Certified Nursing Assistant (CNA) course, which is a brand new course this school year. Students from LinK12 Lakeville and Lakeville North and Lakeville South high schools are taking the online course, which includes hands-on experience at The Fountains at Hosanna senior living home. It is a single-semester course that is offered both semesters of the school year, so another group of students will have the chance to have this same experience in the second half of the school year.
The CNA course shows and teaches students about career possibilities in today’s healthcare field. As the course name suggests, the focus is on certified nursing assistants, which are healthcare professionals who provide care to patients in medical settings under the supervision of a registered nurse or licensed practical nurse. It is a job that is in high demand and can serve as an entry into all aspects of healthcare. At the end of the course, students are eligible to take the Minnesota Nursing Assistant Registry exam to become certified, paving the way for them to be able to find a job as a CNA.
While most of the coursework is delivered online through learning modules, students put what they learn into practice through a two-day hands-on experience at The Fountains at Hosanna. Working with the staff, they provide care to the residents living there. This experience teaches basic nursing skills to assist residents living in senior living. This includes personal care skills, mental health needs, social service needs and restorative services.
“We walked through the staff’s daily morning schedule. We followed them for rounds in the morning, getting all the residents up. The staff showed us how the medications are organized,” said Elsie Dahnert, a senior at Lakeville South who is taking the course.
“We got to follow CNAs for the day. We helped them with little tasks. It was really interesting to see how the CNAs actually do their job every day. It was different seeing it in-person than seeing it in our online lessons,” said Midori Bedford, a senior at Lakeville South.
Dahnert and Bedford both say this course was a great chance for them to get experience in the medical field early on so they could see if it is something they may want to do one day.
“I love everything medical. I want to go into pediatrics somewhere. So I’m planning to major in biology and this experience is a good thing to get on my resume and it could be a job I could work while I’m in college next year,” said Dahnert.
“I’ve actually been planning on going into engineering. I wasn’t sure if I was interested in the medical field, but I figured I would just try this out to see if I was interested. I had some freedom in high school to try a few different things,” said Bedford.
The nursing staff at The Fountains at Hosanna say it is both helpful and encouraging to have high school students come in to help and learn about what they do.
“A lot of them are hands-on and eager. They’re asking, ‘Can I do that? Can I do that?’ It’s nice to see a lot of them wanting to get into healthcare because sometimes there can be miscommunication about what we do. We help the residents physically get through the day doing stuff that maybe you can do, but they can’t do. So it’s nice that the students can actually see that,” said Kim Baker, a lead resident assistant at The Fountains at Hosanna.
“It’s a good experience to learn from, especially if you’re going to get into the healthcare field with nursing or even being a doctor. Working from the bottom up helps and you learn a lot. You learn a lot from the residents too. They have a lot of life experience to share,” said Baker.