Around the country, colleges such as ours recently celebrated Community College Month, an annual recognition of the vital roles that community, junior and technical colleges play in American life.
As part of a movement that built up steam in the 1960s and 1970s and continues to this day, these institutions boast a combined enrollment of nearly 5 million students, according to the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center.
While it鈥檚 incumbent on each college to adapt to the unique needs of the geographical area it serves, a growing trend here in Virginia is to reach across the traditional boundaries of established service regions and pool resources to accomplish more than would be possible for any one college alone.
A great example is the new paramedic program partnership forged by Central Virginia Community College, New River Community College, and Virginia Western Community College, Created to address the region鈥檚 growing demand for skilled paramedics, this partnership has been made possible through funding from GO Virginia Region 2, a state-supported economic development initiative that covers five cities and 13 counties in central and western Virginia.
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An outgrowth of Central Virginia鈥檚 well-established paramedic program, which was founded in 2004, the partnership will expand opportunities for residents of the 麻花视频 region and the New River Valley to pursue training in this high-demand field. Along with the potential benefit to individuals, this expansion is good news to employers such as hospitals, ambulance services and fire departments as they face the challenge of providing greatly needed medical services in the region.
A key feature of the partnership is that students will be able to remain in their communities while taking classes rather than relocating or commuting over long distances.
Thanks to state-of-the-art teaching and learning technology, students will be able to access paramedic-specific courses offered remotely by Central Virginia, while completing lab courses taught at New River and Virginia Western under the oversight of the regional EMS-paramedic program director.
Participants will also complete general education courses at their home college.
New River will begin offering the program at the associate degree level in fall 2025. Virginia Western will start out by offering a career studies certificate and then after some facility renovations, will begin offering the associate degree program in fall 2026. All offerings will fall under Central Virginia鈥檚 accreditation specific to the paramedic field.
While we鈥檙e excited about this initiative, it鈥檚 important to note it鈥檚 not the only one. Each of the colleges participating in this joint effort has also entered into a variety of partnerships with other community colleges, four-year institutions, the public schools, employers and other organizations.
Embracing partnerships has long been a fundamental way in which we operate, but community colleges see an expansion of this approach as offering enormous potential for the future.
A major factor is the technology now available that makes it practical to teach and collaborate across distances that once precluded such cooperation. But it鈥檚 more than that.
By joining forces in this way, our colleges can make the most of the resources provided for the public while at the same time offering programs and services in locations where they might be otherwise unavailable. That鈥檚 a win for students, taxpayers and the Commonwealth as a whole.
