Hello! My name is Jorden and I took the Nursing Assistant program at Combs High School (CHS) from year 2019-2020. I graduated high school with my Licensed Nursing Assistant (LNA) and was able to start work at a local hospital after just a few short months later.
The program set me up to easily get a job with no issues as it also helped me prepare for interviews and prepare a resume.
I am currently on hiatus as a nursing assistant as I am focusing solely on nursing school right now. However, the last 4 years I worked as a pediatric nursing assistant on an oncology floor at Banner Children’s Hospital.
Nursing was always something I knew I wanted to do, I was just unsure of what field of nursing I’d end up in. My initial job was on an adult neuro/stroke unit and realized that was not where my passion was so I switched over to pediatric oncology and immediately fell in love.
I’m not sure I would’ve become a LNA if it was not for the Nursing program at CHS making it so easy. Having it on campus was of value to me because it did make it so easy! All I had to do was walk to another classroom for the program and I feel like it didn’t waste my time and was able to keep my electives of choice. Where as, with having to go to EVIT I would not have been able to keep my choice classes and it also would have taken up more time traveling back and forth each day.
Eventually I would have gotten my nursing degree, but being an LNA has helped me realize that nursing is something that I truly do want to do as a career and that it would be with kids in a hospital setting, whereas I'm not sure I would have figured that out so soon.
The CTE program was truly an influential stepping stone in my career and I would not be where I am without having gone through it. It taught me so much more than just basic nursing skills and is a program all students, interested in the medical field or not should have access to.