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With an aging population across the country, one San Ramon high school is trying to beat the curve by getting students ready for new opportunities in the medical field.
California High now has students in their third year on a medical pathway that could lead to jobs as doctors, nurses, paramedics and more.
“It’s got a really rigorous course work, said Cal High Assistant Principal Peter Stewart, who’s clearly excited about the program. “It’s a UC and CSU approved course.”
Students entering the program start with Principles of Biomedical Science. According to a course description, they learn about health conditions including heart disease, diabetes, sickle-cell disease, hypercholesterolemia, and infectious diseases. They determine the factors that led to the death of a fictional person, and investigate lifestyle choices and medical treatments that might have prolonged the person’s life.
The next step is Human Body Systems, where a course description says they will explore the interactions of body systems: identity, communication, power, movement, protection, and homeostasis. Students design experiments, investigate the structures and functions of the human body, and use data acquisition software to monitor body functions such as muscle movement, reflex and voluntary action, and respiration.
Right now, the first students in the BioMed Academy are in their third year, where they’ll learn about medical interventions. A course description says they”ll investigate the variety of interventions involved in the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of disease as they follow the lives of a fictitious family. The course is a “how-to” manual for maintaining overall health and homeostasis in the body.
Next year, Stewart says students will get to put their learning to the test.
“The capstone course is Biomedical Innovation, and what this is is an internship,” Stewart explained. Students will have the opportunity to work on an independent project and may work with a mentor or adviser from a university, hospital, physician’s office, or industry.
Last year, a county sponsored career fair day brought in people to talk about the different health care fields, where they discusses training, salaries and how much they enjoy their jobs.
In all, 115 students are in the BioMed academy, with 44 in the first class — because so many students were interested, Stewart said the school had to add a class. He said second- and third-year classes each have more than 30 students.
The academy is a challenge for the instructors, too.
Steward said many of them spend the summer training and preparing for the upcoming year so the course work is “rigorous and relevant.”
With about 70 percent of students involved in a field other than their college major five years after graduation, Stewart admits some of the students in the BioMed academy will end up in a different field.
He’s not worried about it, though.
“One of the benefits of this is you get kids who are excited,” he said, adding, “having a goal doesn’t rule out other goals.”
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