VTC’s Nursing Program in Brattlelboro WELCOMES ALL TO THEIR OPEN HOUSE on TUES. Nov. 17
BRATTLEBORO—Vermont Technical College’s Nursing Campus, SE Region, is holding an OPEN HOUSE on Tuesday, November 17 from 4-6 PM at their campus on the second floor of the Brooks House. There will be blood pressure reading and hand-washing demonstrations. VTC Admissions counselors, nursing instructors, nurses and student nurses will be on hand to talk about nursing and the VTC program. Community College of Vermont academic advisors will also be available to talk about pre-requisite nursing courses and a program for high school students allowing them to take college-level classes for free.
VTC’s nursing program in Brattleboro, one of the nation’s first-ever practical schools of nursing, was started shortly after the Civil War and has been in continuous existence since 1907 when funds from Thomas Thompson’s estate made it possible. It has been part of Vermont Technical College since 1994.
Many people walking on Main Street in Brattleboro are often unaware of the hard-working instructors and student nurses just above them in the Brooks House—an inn and tavern in the 1800s where author Rudyard Kipling “enjoyed lager”—and this year’s faculty include a nurse practitioner, obstetrics nurse, psychiatric nurse, neo-natal nurse, operating room nurse and hospital nursing supervisor. Former VTC Brattleboro graduates are now employed at all of the health facilities in the area—including Brattleboro Memorial Hospital, the Brattleboro Retreat, Grace Cottage Hospital, Pine Heights Health Care and Rehabilitation, as well as health care facilities, agencies and doctors’ offices in neighboring New Hampshire, Massachusetts and New York.
As the New York Times reported in February of this year, registered nurses now account for the third-largest middle-income occupation in the US. “We are at the bell curve,” VTC’s SE Site Director, Becky Steele, said. “Baby boomers just began to retire three years ago and now not only do they increasingly require health care, many baby-boomer nurses are beginning to retire as well and there will be a critical shortage of health care workers in the near future.” Steele went on to explain that VTC’s Southeastern campus has the distinction “of being able to offer a high-tech nursing education right here in Southern Vermont, easily accessible to potential nursing students in Brattleboro and its neighboring communities.”
VTC’s Southeast Region Nursing Campus, located in the beautifully restored historic Brooks House on Main Street, is one of five regional campuses with nine different locations across the entire state of Vermont with a central campus in Randolph. In August, the Practical Nursing (LPN) and Associate Degree in Nursing (RN) programs were notified of their continuing official accreditation from the Accreditation Commission for Education in Nursing (ACEN) and the Bachelor of Science in Nursing Program, an online program started a year and a half ago, also achieved accreditation—not a small feat and something for which the nursing program prepared over many years.
The Vermont Tech nursing program graduates have some of the highest pass rates for their boards (NCLEX) in the nation and each year the program graduates approximately 130 future RNs and 150 soon-to-be LPNs. While the very first two students graduated from last year’s inaugural online BSN program, 59 students are actively enrolled in the bachelor’s program this year.
For more information about the Southeast Region (Brattleboro/Springfield) Campus of VTC Nursing, call: 802-254-5516. For general info about the nursing program or other VTC areas of study contact: 800-442-8821
