Developing Skills with George Keeney
by Vicki Heisser |
As many schools close their doors and move to distance learning platforms, college instructors are doing what they can to ensure students still get the education they need. PWSC caught up with EMT (Emergency Medical Technician) and ETT (Emergency Trauma Technician) instruc-tor, George Keeney, to discuss how taking his courses online has shaped instruction, student interaction, and learning.
Keeney teaches dual enrollment courses to high school students, and those have now gone online. The main focus for online learning, Keeney explains, is readings and reviews. He says that with online learning, “the kids seem to be doing well with it. I'm actually getting positive feedback. My stu-dents are having to read some, but we are reducing how much they actually have to do. However, they have a whole week to finish my class. So, it's going to be good for them.”
There are many different online platforms that colleges and universities are using. Keeney’s course, he explains, is using “School classroom, a virtual online plat-form. What it does is you actually create your assignments right there on a class-room platform and then students can actually respond to your class. They copy the quiz that I've given them, and then they can send it back to me for grading, which has been pretty good. I've even got some extra credit in there so they can get their extra credit approved.”
Keeney himself is doing well in the online space and he has “learned a lot by doing the program online, so that's neat.”
While the online learning is going well for all concerned, for the hands-on requirements for the state-run courses, Keen-ey has to wait for the state. “Well, we're trying to make it really work for our students and get them the best education they can get. It is going to be somewhat tough on the EMS part because I can only have so many people in a classroom and it is all hands-on stuff. The state has all the information and all the requirements for the courses that we teach from ETT all the way up to Paramedic. We're going to see what the state comes up with for solutions. They're having a meet-ing with us soon, then we'll know what we have to do to finish our classes.”
The skills students learn in these courses are vital during times like these. Keeney shares, “Well, right now our health care service is maxing out. They've got to check people before they come into the facility to see if they have a tempera-ture and so forth. And we've actually prepared the students that we have now. We've got a couple of them over there working and they're helping out the hospital. And then I just finished a list for the police chief and the planning chief in Valdez so that they can call up any of my three years’ worth of students and actually use them in this disaster.”
As the interview with Keeney came to a close, he emphasized the need to take this current situation seriously. “This pandemic is something that we really need to look at. I know that in my age group, we take it real seriously because we are the ones that they're saying can get the worst part of this whole thing. I'm glad to see our community making sure that the students and everybody know how dangerous this is and how to prepare for it. Wash your hands. I mean, that's the biggest thing that everybody can do. Then we're trying to reduce our contact area with anybody. Then also we're trying to reduce how many people we’re around.”
It’s unclear how long this pandemic will last, but the PWSC community is doing all they can to make sure students can continue their education in a safe and academically rich environment.