CMC receives $1.9 million annually for 5 years for healthcare training

This is excerpted from a story published on Sept. 29 and written by Colorado Sun education reporter Erica Breunlin. 

By Erica Breunlin, Colorado Sun

Rural communities across Colorado will train and retain healthcare workers, expand mobile healthcare clinics and adopt modern electronic health record systems — among other priorities — through nearly $170 million in federal grant funds aimed at improving access to care for rural residents.

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Colorado Mountain College, the only institution of higher education to net grant funding, will use an annual $1.9 million to train more than 200 healthcare professionals over the next five years. The college, which received the funding in partnership with seven hospitals, is also the only institution of higher education with a physical presence in mountain communities like Vail, Aspen, Glenwood Springs and Rifle. Its programs have become a major training ground for critical healthcare positions in those mountain towns, according to Colorado Mountain College President Matt Gianneschi.

Grant dollars will allow the college to add eight or nine new positions, including faculty and support staff, to expand some healthcare programs and bring back others the institution previously paused.

Among the college’s top priorities is doubling the number of students in its two-year radiology program, which launched with a capacity of 12 students this fall. Colorado Mountain College initially had enough faculty to accept a new class of students every other year. With the grant money, the college will now be able to enroll a new cohort every year, Gianneschi said. Students can pursue an associate’s degree with the goal of becoming a radiology technician or earn a bachelor’s degree and become qualified for a career in advanced imaging.

Colorado Mountain College will also reintroduce its surgical technician program, what Gianneschi describes as “a critical need” for rural hospitals, and a certification for instrument sterilization.

Those positions, desperately needed by local hospitals trying to care for aging populations in mountain towns, offer students a shot at a living wage, Gianneschi said.

“For many of our folks, this is a once-in-a-career kind of opportunity to have the kind of impact that they’ve always dreamed of in supporting their communities,” he said.

The grant will also give the college a boost in continuing to meet the needs of local economies, which are increasingly relying on healthcare, Gianneschi said.

“We exist to ensure that the mountain communities have the workforce that they need to survive, to exist, to thrive,” he said, adding that the outcomes from the funding will be “truly transformational” in rural Colorado.

To read the complete story, visit Rural Colorado communities getting healthcare upgrades with $170M in federal grants.