NPHS Begins P-Tech Program

Next year, North Providence High School will become one of only five schools in Rhode Island to offer P-Tech: Pathways in Technology Early College High School Initiative.

PTECH in North Providence High School is working with three partners in a statewide initiative: school districts, higher education institutions (CCRI), and industry partners (Fatima Hospital, Lifespan, SteppingUpRI and Golden and Cedar Crest Nursing Homes). PTECH includes four main committees: Curriculum, Workplace Experience, Recruiting, and Messaging and Marketing.

The program is meant to prepare students with potential careers in nursing. Through the classes, students will be able to receive training in CPR as well as graduate high school with an Associate’s degree in Health Sciences and Health Care Administration.

Mrs. Melissa Caffrey, director of the new and upcoming PTECH program, provided insight into this great opportunity for students interested in health care for their futures. Working right inside North Providence High School, the program will open to incoming freshman next year. As this program is in development, Mrs. Caffrey is in charge of determining its scope and sequence. She is currently working with others in aligning the students’ courses for high school and their degrees.

The idea for the program began in March of 2015 when Superintendent Smith was working with a lot of students, mainly from CCRI and URI, after a surgery and they talked to her about how they found their interest in health services. She then realized how many job opportunities there are in the health care field and did research around what opportunities there could be for students and then what kind of pathway could be established at the high school.

Seeing as Fatima Hospital, a large employer in the town, was right around the corner and the high school was not really tapping into any of those resources for its students, Supt. Smith’s first course of action was to have an appointment with the director of Fatima Hospital. She was directed to Marianne Raimondo, director of Health Care Administration in the School of Management at RIC. They met and they tried to figure out how they could create classes at the high school that would put students on the right path to enter RIC either for a clinical setting of nursing or for health management because that is a unique field under the business umbrella.

As they were planning to creating a plan for new classes, Mr. Jones the Special Education director was designing the new transition room. Supt. Smith wanted to be able to offer students the opportunity to get CNA training and come out of highschool with a CNA certificate. She had Mr. Jones build into the transition room, an actual hospital room. Golden Crest nursing home provided the hospital bed and equipment. The area can be used for CNA training and classroom space. The CNA training will be after school and students can get credit on their transcript for an extended learning opportunity, or ELO.

In order to find funding they decided to write the grant to develop a health care academy at the high school through P-TECH. This program allows students  to come out of NPHS in either 4, 5 or 6 years, with an associates degree for free, either in Health Sciences and Health Care Administration.

Students will be recruited for the program from the middle schools as 8th graders begin planning classes for their freshman year, or first year of high school. Although it has yet to be determined if it will be opened up to current 9th graders. Students in the program will need to take foundation courses along with their school curriculum requirements.  Extra courses may come as ELOs, summer work, or virtual work. The goal is for students to receive associated degrees at the same time they receive their high school diplomas. Once they enroll as P-TECH students, they will also be considered as CCRI students.

In order to teach the classes, some teachers will get certified to teach CCRI courses and then students may actually go to CCRI to take certain courses. Caffrey and her team are in the process of developing the scoping sequence of the classes that have to line up with CCRI to be sure the high school has all the foundation courses for students to take. Caffrey is especially grateful for the participation and guidance of Dan Sutton, member of the board of directors of RI State Commerce, whose has been a big part in the development of this program.

PTECH provides a regular high school experience with real-life and hands-on work experience in a variety of different health care professions. Although this program does give a legitimate degree, PTECH is also just a stepping stone to a more formal education. This opportunity enables kids to reach their professional lives quicker. Mrs. Caffrey has very big hopes for this program stating, “I believe that PTECH will become a great success. The pathway we are implementing in health care is very lucrative, meaning that there is a great amount of jobs in the health industry and this program gives them the opportunity to have a good paying job and career at an early age. It’s such an exciting and innovative program, I’m confident that it will be successful.”