“By changing our curriculum and adding online products from F.A. Davis, we have improved our employment rate to 100%.” April Kesler Department Chair for Surgical Technology and Sterile Processing Owens Community College
April has been the Department Chair for Surgical Technology and Sterile Processing at Owens Community College (Owens CC) for 1 year. Prior to that, she spent 7 years at Northwestern Michigan College as the Surgical Technology Program Coordinator. She also works part-time as a Certified Surgical Technologist at a community hospital. Owens CC admitted 15 students into their 2-year, Associate-degree Surgical Tech program in 2023, twice as many students as they had admitted in 2022. Students range in age from 18-50, some joining the program to train for second careers. The job market for Surgical Technologists is strong for Owen CC graduates; there are over 150 openings in the county and over 300 in the region. The challenge: Ensuring students gain the skills they need to pass the certification exam and get jobs When April came on board at Owens CC, they did not have a 100% employment rate for their graduates, despite the strong job market. All graduates took the Surgical Technology Certification Exam and their pass rates were good. But, as April points out, “ even if students pass the exam, they won’t get jobs if their skill level is low. ” In her new role, she immediately set out to improve the skill level of her students and increase the employment rate of her graduates. The solution: A revamped curriculum with new online and print resources April identified changes that needed to be made to the curriculum, including changing the clinical schedule and the number of hours students spent in clinical. “Students used to spend 3,000 hours in clinical over the course of the program. The school was using the clinical sites to instruct the students as well as train them, so they would arrive in clinical without the skills needed to perform at a satisfactory level.” The school reduced the number of hours to 1,000. This has allowed students to complete a lot of their clinical requirements early in the program so they can spend more time learning the skills they need to get a job. In addition, April added new books and interactive, online components to give the students more opportunities for practice and application. “We started using the F.A. Davis surgical instrumentation book, Differentiating Surgical Instruments , because it included the Surg Tech in Practice courseware. This gave us a really nice way for students to learn how an instrument is used and has improved their critical thinking.” April delivers the lectures online and then assigns online activities that have to be completed before coming to class. That way, in the classroom, they can focus on group activities and active learning. The school also uses the F.A. Davis Pocket Guide to the Operating Room . “This is a really solid product that is beloved by the students. The Pocket Guide gives the students so much information on everything they need to know but in an understandable way. And they can carry it with them.” Owens CC also adopted the Understanding Anatomy & Physiology: A Visual, Auditory, Interactive Approach text and its workbook from F.A. Davis because April felt the A&P coverage in their other books was too light and students weren’t
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