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VCC health care assistant program to add stream with focus on Aboriginal students

VANCOUVER -- Vancouver Community College's health care assistant program is expanding to include a stream for Aboriginal students, with the help of one-time funding from B.C.'s Ministry of Advanced Education and Labour Market Development.

"Vancouver Community College is pleased to expand the health care assistant program with a focus on Aboriginal students," says VCC president Kathy Kinloch. "This program will integrate Aboriginal culture and issues throughout the curriculum, and the skills our Aboriginal students gain will be an invaluable asset to the communities they serve in British Columbia."

The initial funding proposal was accompanied by letters of support from surrounding First Nations communities, says Pat Bawtinheimer, VCC's dean of health sciences, "This ensures that the graduates will be able to make significant contributions to these communities," Bawtinheimer says. "VCC is always looking for additional opportunities to support Aboriginal communities and learners."

Vancouver Community College is also partnering with the Nicola Valley Institute of Technology to train Aboriginal students as medical office assistants in 2010-11. VCC will help with delivery of the Aboriginal college's medical office assistant program and will also provide curriculum support and instructor mentorship to NVIT.

VCC's interim director of Aboriginal education and services, Laara Mixon, says the program expansion is exciting for the Squamish and Musqueam Nations, which are both in the process of building health care facilities for Elders and will soon need to hire health care assistants. "The health care assistant program also supports the B.C. First Nations Health Plan, will create meaningful employment in the largest sector projected for new jobs in B.C. until 2019, and will mitigate skill and labour shortages for the benefit of all British Columbians," she says.