This fall, KidsPeace welcomes students in the Emerging Health Professionals program at Lehigh Career & Technical Institute (LCTI) to a series of presentations on career opportunities in mental and behavioral health.
On November 13, 52 LCTI students attended the first of three sessions at the Donley TEC facility at KidsPeace’s Orchard Hills campus. They heard from Mary Anne Moore, director of nursing for KidsPeace Children’s Hospital; Eileen DeSalva, director of nursing for Pennsylvania Residential and Community Programs; DeeAnn Cobb, nurse supervisor of Community Programs and Kidshaven; and Jessica Racine, director of social services at KidsPeace Children’s Hospital.
KidsPeace joins other Lehigh Valley healthcare providers in participating in the program, one of a number of innovative career training initiatives pioneered by LCTI.
“We were very excited to have KidsPeace express interest in participating,” said Donna Pavlovic, RN, M.Ed, who oversees the Emerging Health Professionals program. “It’s a great chance for our students to learn more about the specifics of the mental health field, to go along with their training at other providers.”
Mary Anne Moore, Director of Nursing at KidsPeace Children’s Hospital, conducts an interactive exercise with Emerging Health Professionals program students.
Among the attendees at the first presentation was Carol McCarthy, clinical assistant to the medical director at KidsPeace Children’s Hospital – whom Pavlovic credited with being one of the architects of the Emerging Health Professionals program when it was developed in the mid-2000s.
Brandon Sagan, a participant from Northwestern Lehigh, said that while he was familiar with KidsPeace before the session, he found the presentation valuable. “I wasn’t aware of all the things that a Director of Nursing does, so that was an interesting insight.”
