Students targeted for future jobs

BEHIND THE SCENES: High school students recently were given the opportunity, by the Hospital Association of Rhode Island, to watch a satellite broadcast of Dr. Arun Singh perform open heart surgery, shown above. /
BEHIND THE SCENES: High school students recently were given the opportunity, by the Hospital Association of Rhode Island, to watch a satellite broadcast of Dr. Arun Singh perform open heart surgery, shown above. /

Rhode Island human resource managers have to walk a fine line deciding how to split time between training employees and preparing students for future employment.
Since 2003, the state’s health care, financial and biotechnology industries have done the best balancing act, said Linda Lulli, associate vice president for human resources at Bryant University. Lulli in 2003 released a report through the R.I. Human Resources Management Association on school-to-career programs.
Since that report, a slowing economy and work force shortages (including the statewide shortage of nurses), have made business support for students even more important, she says.
“There needs to be more of an HR presence in work force development activities and sustaining them,” she said. “From a human resources-profession perspective, if we’re going to be making strategic contributions to our business, we need to be in the forefront in that effort.”
One of the strongest school-to-career programs continues to be Lifespan’s Youth Employment program, which reaches out to high school students living near its hospitals. The summer-long program is expanding and will likely become a year-round program, said Alexis Devine, youth development coordinator.
At Lifespan, the participating students aren’t treated as interns or volunteers – and that’s what’s important about the program and ones like it, Devine said. Because students are trained by human resource professionals – one day each week is devoted to professional development learning – they’re better suited for any workplace.
Most go on after high school to work in the health field or retain a part-time job while working through higher education. Now, 45 of the program’s 160 participants have become full-time Lifespan employees. Without a program like Lifespan’s and the human resources element, many wouldn’t know how eligible for and valuable to the workplace they could be, Devine said.
While Lifespan’s program is growing, another health care school-to-career program is shrinking. In 1998, the Hospital Association of Rhode Island (HARI) took a different path toward informing high school students about the possibility of a health care profession.
HARI put together several satellite surgeries, for which students are encouraged to ask doctors questions in real time what they’re doing and the organization runs an externship program for high school teachers, said Ruth Ricciarelli, executive director of HARI’s Center for Health Professionals.
In all, 155 teachers have participated in the externship and Amanda Barney, HARI spokeswoman, estimates that 40,000 Rhode Island high school students have reaped the benefits. But with HARI’s changing focus – based on the grants it’s been awarded – the program has been declining in numbers.
“We still offer it, but unfortunately last year there was no response. Our focus has changed … we’re really targeting immediate work force needs and looking at either our emerging work force – meaning post-grad, post-college – or our incumbent employees,” Ricciarelli said.
But the effort to train students has to come from both sides – both from school coordinators and from human resources personnel, Lulli said. Now, higher education and government boards are both pushing the programs more than ever, she said.
“I would say there’s been more interest, particularly through the [hospital] scan [programs] and some of the mastery-skill areas. And the Governor’s Workforce Board is really taking more of a goal in ensuring that there is an opportunity for experiential learning in some form,” Lulli said. “I think there’s much more of an interest in that, given the economy and where we’re going with our workforce shortages.”
Bryant attracts high school students during the summer so “hopefully, early on, there’s an engagement with students about why continuing education is important. But, also, we’re giving them a better exposure toward understanding the better possibilities that are out there,” said Judith Clare, director of the Amica Center for Career Education.
Retention of students graduating from Rhode Island universities and colleges has also become a goal of the R.I. Economic Policy Council. The state doesn’t want to “lose” recent graduates, “because clearly, here, it’s important to our economy that they stay here and thrive,” Clare said.
That’s where school-to-career programs and human resource professionals can help, Lulli said.
“From a human resources development standpoint, I think, ‘How do you engage students early, so they stay in the education system and become a viable worker or have a professional opportunity available to them?’” Lulli said. “And what can businesses do to really provide for those challenges?” •

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