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Taking students - Do you, and why?


MedicNorth

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In two weeks my second student of the year is scheduled to arrive, and as always I am looking forward to it. I have been trying for 2 per year for a while.

EMS preceptorship is an interesting animal - The way things are set up nobody can get in without a practicum, and there is no way to force practitioners to take a student, especially since it is a lot of unpaid work. I love doing this. To be honest, I usually learn as much from them as they do from me. I find that somehow it refreshes my outlook on this job and sometimes reminds me why I went into EMS in the first place. That being said, I know it is not for everybody. There can also be a lot of frustration, personality issues, and, quite frankly, failure - success is never guaranteed.

My questions: Do you take students on a regular basis? Why or why not?

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I don't know if it's a regional thing or if it differs with companies, but when I was precepting, It was done through my ambulance company as part of my training. I was paid while doing it and the preceptors were "hired" by the company after they went through training to teach. We were scheduled by the education department and had to complete a certain number of tasks/scenarios before being "set free". I'm not sure if there is an opportunity here in the US to get students on one's own.

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That is called orientation here - you get hired, and assigned to a specific crew on regular shifts to learn the local ropes. You get paid for that, and once you have completed the assigned tasks you are on your own.

The students I am taking are people who have completed their classroom and lab training, but are not yet finished because we have a practicum requirement before you can register. The practicum is generally 4 to 6 weeks, and must be completed before writing ACP (our NREMT exam) is possible.

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Only 4 to 6 weeks for an ACP practicum? That's pretty short. Our Sask ACPs have 678 hours of EMS practicum time. That works out to about 16 weeks doing a 4 on/ 4 off shift. Our aviation operation is looking at getting a larger plane. Once that occurs I'm going to offer an optional aviation practicum to ACP and PCP students. They\ll have to pay extra, but it may be something they'd be interested in.

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lol - I keep forgetting that ACP means something different to non-Albertans - I mean Alberta College of Paramedics ACP, not Advanced Care Paramedic. Our ACP (EMT-P) practicum is right up there in hours too. Sorry for the confusion!

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Students force you to either remain up to date or become a lousy preceptor. For myself I find it re-invigorates my appetite for the job. It's also a wonderfully variable experience figuring out how to best assist any given student in the learning process. Some are academically strong and skill weak while others are the opposite with any combination of the above possible.

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