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Date: 4/18/2022
PALMER - The Palmer Schools District budget will determine if an EMT course will be added to the high school next year.
During the School Committee meeting on April 13, Chairperson Bonny Rathbone said, “The Palmer High School team has considered multiple options in order to offer an EMT certification course at Palmer High School (PHS).”
She added that considerations could be made to include the hosting fees, plus 50 percent of the course for 10 participants.
Amanda Babinski, director of finance, said Susan North, principal of PHS, and her team felt strongly about offering this course next year. “They put a lot of work into trying to get it up and running,” said Babinski.
She said that some of the ideas they would like the board to consider is capping the program at 10 students and requiring them to pay half of the participation fee. “That would leave us with $19,500 to put into the fiscal year 2023 (FY23) budget,” added Babinski.
She continued, “We’re recommending putting that in by reducing the Palmer High School textbook line item: $10,000 and the additional $9,500, we could take out of ESSER [Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief] funds, ESSA [Every Student Succeeds Act] funds,” which covers all student engagement, safety and mental health type of activities; or revolving accounts. Babinski said they have higher balances in these revolving accounts than have been put into the offsets.
Based on this, Babinski said a student could pay anywhere between $1,000 to $1,500 to take the EMT course.
Erica Nadeau, School Committee member asked, “If there is a large amount of interest in the course, how are you going to select the students that get to participate in it?”
North replied, “Seniors would have first choice because they’re seniors and then they would be graduating. If we had more than 10 seniors, then I would pull those individuals into the auditorium so that they were sitting right there, and we would randomly pick 10…”
Nadeau followed up by asking what would be done if they didn’t have 10 students interested in taking the course.
North said they are looking for 10 students to meet the needs on both ends, including the Palmer Ambulance Department and the schools. “[The Palmer Ambulance has] had to work with the state in order to get permits, in order to get approval for this to happen in a school setting and then our science department heads have worked really hard to collaborate with them in order to make this happen,” she said.
North explained that this course would last for an entire semester. “The great thing about students paying half of it is that they’re only paying half of it,” she said.
North continued, “It really shows a strong commitment for getting the certification. As many of you know, right now, the medical field really needs EMTs and nurses, so this is giving them the opportunity to explore this field, to get a certificate and to be able to earn money right away.”
Rathbone said a course such as this one look good on a resume when going on to pursue an education within the medical field.
Superintendent Patricia Gardner said, “This really starts building our school-to-work pipeline.”
Rathbone said that it would be cheaper to take this course through the school district rather than taking it elsewhere. “I’m just so thrilled that we’re even thinking of offering this course. I think it speaks volumes about what we’re offering the kids in Palmer, and we’ve got the collaboration with Palmer Ambulance as well,” she said.
North noted that the Palmer Ambulance has been “wonderful” to collaborate with, as they have done internships with PHS students in the past. She added that Karen Anti, School-to-Career facilitator at PHS, has a program that places students in different locations to explore similar opportunities.
When meeting with the current junior class about scheduling courses for next year, North said they expressed excitement for this potential offering. She believes that the numbers will be there.
As the approval of the EMT course is dependent on the school’s budget, the committee decided to vote on this item during their meeting next month, after the working budget session is complete.