Small Health Care Campus Finds Success in Lynwood

By LAURENCE DARMIENTO

Staff Reporter

The campus of St. Francis Career College is not much to look at. Stuffed into the fifth floor of a medical office building in Lynwood, the school for nurses and health care technicians has desks crammed in odd spots, paint chipping off the wall, and plain linoleum in the hallway.

But it’s here, across from St. Francis Medical Center, the Catholic hospital that operates it, where under-achieving, low-income and minority students who might not make it elsewhere are being converted into health industry professionals. The school has been so successful that it’s in the midst of a major expansion, increasing its enrollment from 180 students last year, to 300 currently, with plans to enroll 400 or more next year.

It’s filling a need at a time when the industry is in desperate need for all the bodies it can find, especially nurses. The demand is only expected to increase when state-mandated staffing ratios are implemented next year.

“You see people who wouldn’t be given a second chance becoming excellent health care providers,” said Carol Lee Thorpe, the college’s administrator. “These are people who have every reason not to succeed.”

The college’s roots extend back to 1989 when the medical center decided to start a small licensed vocational nurse training program with 15 students in the last few months of their senior year at Lynwood High School.

As a not-for-profit Catholic facility, part of its mission is to improve the community and to provide the students, many of who might find themselves flipping burgers, with a career path.

The school grew slowly at first, gaining a variety of accreditations. Along the way it added training programs for emergency medical technicians, certified nurse assistants and other health technicians. It also has a small registered nursing program and professional education courses.

Grants available

The vocational nursing program costs $13,600, including books, supplies and other fees, almost twice the cost of a community college program. But school officials say students qualify for generous private grants, as well as government aid, to the point where they can graduate without debt.

The school claims that over 90 percent of the students who enter finish, with the vocational nursing statistics particularly impressive. Every student who graduates finds a job, hired by hospitals, registries, clinics and other employers. And in the last round of testing all 12 students who took the licensing exam passed. “At our school the students’ motivation is very very high,” said Asma Khan, an associate dean.

Khan ought to know. For 13 years she taught nursing at a community college, where she was used to seeing half the nursing students drop out and just 60 to 70 percent pass the exam.

So what is the key to St. Francis’ success? School administrators note that the school is run according to strict Catholic school principles, even though the students’ average age is in the 20s. That means any kind of slovenliness is barred. Students must wear clean blue uniforms and be on time.

“If the second hand strikes seven and you are not in the classroom, they will close the door on you,” said Yvette Favela, a June 2000 graduate of the vocational nurse program. “It’s military style.”

Administrators say the strictness has a purpose. It readies the students for the world of work in particular the responsibility of caring for patients.

Counseling offered

Schoolwork is also monitored weekly, and counseling and services are offered for a variety of problems such as child care, domestic violence, meal tickets, emergency housing and the like.

Shirley Todman, a 27-year-old vocational nursing student on public assistance, has the typical challenges juggling school work with raising her children. And the 14-month program is intense, with students attending classes eight hours a day Monday through Friday.

“The material is complex. You really have to give 100 percent,” said Todman. “I tell (my friends) if you are committed this is the best place to come. If you are not, don’t waste your time or their time.”

Jim Lott, executive vice president of the Healthcare Association of Southern California, the hospital industry’s regional trade group, said the program is a throwback to earlier days when hospitals ran their own nursing programs. Those programs faded as state universities and community colleges began offering courses that are far cheaper to operate.

“They are getting low-income students into nursing, which is not being done too well today, but the real solution (to the nursing shortage) is getting the state to increase the slots at university and community college programs,” he said.

That may be so, but school officials have their sights set on a plan to build a $40 million campus for the St. Francis program. With fundraising yet to start, Thorpe said completion of the campus is some five years away.