Vim & Vigor - Fall 2019 - CH - 8

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CEO of St. Catherine Hospital. "Our goal is to
help connect East Chicago high school students
to rewarding careers in healthcare. We have made
a commitment to help them see firsthand what a
future in healthcare would be like."
A range of positions are represented, with mentors from hospital engineering and finance departments to nursing and administrative roles.
"Each and every one of the students who were
selected for the program is college material, and it's
important that someone tells them that," says R.
Louie Gonzalez, chancellor at Ivy Tech Community
College. He says he had a teacher who saw potential
in him and made sure he applied for college. "That
was a life-changer for me."
St. Catherine Hospital Human Resources Director
Dianna Myers says the goal of mentors is ultimately
to integrate students into the evolving workplace.
"It's a great opportunity for the hospital to cultivate talent and get the students excited about careers
in healthcare and for the students to find their passion and become ready for the workplace," she says.

Healthcare providers
meet at the Northwest
Indiana Healthcare
Consortium. The
consortium serves as
a forum for schools
to hear about the
needs of healthcare
employers.

Pharmacy
technician Andrea
L. Smith shows
high school intern
Sage Sweeney
how medications
are tracked and
monitored in
the inpatient
pharmacy of
Community
Hospital.

FA L L 2 0 1 9

Interested in a Career
in Healthcare?
For more information on career
opportunities with the hospitals of
Community Healthcare System, visit
COMHS.org/careers and click on
"Professional Development."

Community Hospital

Like the other Northwest Indiana high schools,
Munster High School is ensuring that students complete coursework toward new Graduation Pathways
diploma requirements.
"Employability skills and workplace skills are
necessary for graduation requirements, so we established some internships for our students," says Brad
Docter, career and technical education coordinator
for Munster High School. "Two areas that we have
career paths for are engineering and healthcare. For
our healthcare students, we work with Education
Services at Community Hospital in Munster."
Every day school is in session, five students from
Munster High School go to Community Hospital during two class periods (about 90 minutes). They are
scheduled to one area for two weeks at a time, then
rotate to a different area of the hospital. Five fields
are offered, including nursing (along with a variety of
subcategories), lab, radiology, pharmacy and biomed.
"We rotate our high school students and nursing students so they can see how well we all work
together," says Jean Gardner, system director of
Education Services, Community Healthcare System.
"People feel comfortable here and that's part of our
retention efforts. We are doing everything we can to
make this a positive experience. Going from 'school
to scrubs' may help students figure now if this is
what they want to do for their career, so it has personal value as well."
"Being in a hospital and experiencing the work
environment is a great experience for students,"
says Community Hospital CEO Lou Molina. "They
are getting a firsthand look at what we do; something that they can put on a resume or college application. Hopefully, they will come back someday and
be hired by Community Healthcare System." ■

http://www.COMHS.org/careers

Vim & Vigor - Fall 2019 - CH

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