This month marks a milestone for eight students who successfully completed the Practical Nursing (PN) program at CNC’s Burns Lake campus.
CNC started with 11 students in the Practical Nursing, however, due to various reasons, three students exited the program at different stages. The average attrition rate in larger Health Sciences programs is between 25-27 per cent, which puts the PN program in Burns Lake on par with that. All Health Sciences programs are very demanding, and students sometimes find the competing demands of school and life cannot be balanced at that particular time.
This achievement is not only the first time the PN program was offered in Burns Lake but also the first time it was delivered at a CNC campus outside of Prince George.
“I’m extremely proud of the practical nursing students and their achievement,” said Corinne George, Regional Principal of CNC’s Burns Lake campus. “This is a tremendous landmark for our campus.”
CNC PN student Linda Schmidt was living in Kamloops when she considered a career change after 19 years of working in the dental industry.
She had her eye on the PN program at Thompson Rivers University’s campus in Williams Lake but found herself moving back to her hometown of Burns Lake to pursue a different opportunity instead.
“I heard an advertisement that CNC in Burns Lake was offering the exact same program,” she said. “It seemed like it was meant to be, so I applied.”
Erin Petrusic knew she wanted to go back to school but had no desire to uproot her family from the community of Grassy Plains. After stopping by CNC’s Burns Lake campus to speak with an academic advisor, she learned about the upcoming PN program. Though the thought of becoming a nurse had never crossed her mind before, it piqued her interest.
“I thought about it for a while and decided it was something I could do,” Petrusic said. “The fact that it was being delivered locally was a huge deal for me. If this program had not been in Burns Lake, I would not have done it.”
Program coordinator and instructor Guillermo Leon-Torres said the support of the community of Burns Lake, Northern Health, and important partners in the region was crucial to the success of this program.
The clinical placements that give students hands on practical experience in the field are central to any health program. Leon-Torres said these connections were established quickly in Burns Lake and the surrounding area.
“The staff at the clinical sites were very supportive and happy to see our students,” he said. “They were always willing to answer questions, share information and be closely involved with the students’ learning.”
Now that the program is completed, Schmidt and Petrusic are planning the next steps to their future.
Petrusic, who enjoyed exploring the scope of work of a PN throughout clinical, is currently reflecting on where her interests lie before applying for jobs.
Schmidt has a job at the Lakes District Hospital and Care Centre and is happy to be able to continue living and working in Burns Lake.
“It’s nice to be able to put in all that hard work, all that time, all that money, and have a job at the end of it,” she said. “I grew up in a small town so it was important for me to live, work and give back to a small town. It just worked out perfectly that I’m back where I grew up.”
The students who completed the program need to write the Canadian Practical Nurse Registration Examination (CPNRE), which takes place at different times during the summer. Passing the CPNRE will give them a full license as Practical Nurses in the Province of British Columbia.