First 10 Peninsula College students complete shadow experience

by Emma Maple

PORT ANGELES — Peninsula College’s nursing program has added the Clallam County jail to its cohort of partner clinical sites.

The partnership, which was approved in October, is a return of a similar one that had ended due to COVID-19 shutdowns.

“I’m really grateful that they were excited about coming back on board,” Peninsula College Nursing Program Specialist Kate Dexter said.

The jail is joining as one of Peninsula College’s psychiatric partnerships in which they will allow approved students to participate in a psychiatric shadow experience at the jail.

Shadow experiences are a one-time shift that lasts about six hours, Dexter said.

Throughout their two years in the Peninsula College nursing program, students complete a variety of shadow experiences. It is required that at least one of those experiences is psychiatric.

The jail will be one of four options from which students can choose to do their psychiatric shadow experience. The other three are the West End Outreach Services at Forks Community Hospital, the North Olympic Healthcare Network and the Port Angeles Fire Department/Community Paramedicine.

The college currently is working to add the Clallam Bay Corrections Center as an option for a psychiatric shadow experience, Dexter said.

The first group of 10 students have completed their experience at the jail. So far, Dexter said she’s generally heard good feedback from everyone involved.

“People were excited about it,” she said.

Allowing the students to work in the jail “demystifies it,” Dexter added. “It makes it easier to say, ‘That’s something I’m interested in doing,’ or ‘This is not for me.’”

Students who train at the jail also may choose to come back and work for it in the future, Clallam County Sheriff Brian King said during a Clallam County commissioners’ work session in October.

“I believe that this agreement with Peninsula College will give us the opportunity to recruit future staff,” he said. “It will provide a foundation to see what it’s like to provide health care in a correctional setting.”

Nursing students also complete a preceptorship in their sixth and last quarter. That includes a four-week block in which the student is partnered with a full-time community preceptor, usually a nurse, and works the same shift as the nurse for those four weeks. Dexter said that allows students to work in an area of nursing they are most interested in.

Dexter said she’s currently in communication with the jail to see if they can accommodate a preceptor.

In addition to shadow experiences and preceptorships, nursing students are required to do five-week clinical blocks in their second, third, fourth and fifth quarters, giving them more real-life experiences.

Other partner organizations specifically for the clinical blocks include Avamere Olympic Rehabilitation of Sequim, the Forks Community Hospital, Jefferson Healthcare, Olympic Medical Center and the Port Angeles School District.

The variety of partners across shadow experiences, preceptorships and clinical blocks allow students to get a range of knowledge of the different ways healthcare workers engage with the community, Dexter said.

“We have really incredible community partners in our healthcare system,” Dexter said. “It’s unique, in the state, to have the kind of partnership and network that we have.”

“I’m just consistently impressed by how quickly organizations say yes to us,” she added.