GUILFORD COUNTY, N.C. — Guilford County Emergency Services is seeking $400,000 in money from the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) to expand its entire training department.
The grant money would be used to overhaul the department's training department, allowing them to upgrade their equipment and facilities as well as adapt to changing needs due to the pandemic.
"Some of our previous training prior to the pandemic was done in person, and with EMS education, our job is very hands-on," said Jan Paladino, the emergency services manager of training with Guilford County. "With the pandemic, we had to kind of backpedal on that a little bit and do live education virtually so there were more courses that we were creating and then we put it online, and employees would watch that education instead of coming in and doing things hands-on."
Paladino said the ARPA funding would mean improving on those virtual training, but she said Guilford Emergency Services is looking at a hybrid model for training.
"So the didactic material that we can present through a lecture, we can put that online but when we need them to come in and do the skills we can bring them in," said Paladino.
Right now, the department has one training facility on Meadowood St. in Greensboro. It has two 'scenario spaces,' where trainees can practice real-life situations, and three traditional classrooms. Paladino hopes they can use the ARPA funding to expand on what they have and improve equipment, including potentially getting smartboards and virtual reality. Another potential training tool would be a room designed as a real-life home to better prepare trainees for the real world.
"New equipment leads to new training strategies, so that will help," Paladino said. "We don’t currently have access to (virtual reality) but it is an available tool that you can use for EMS education."
According to Paladino, they hope to learn if they receive the funding by late summer.
Following a nationwide trend, Guilford County Emergency Services has struggled with staffing due to the pandemic and they haven't been able to fully recover.
"(Our providers) are overworked and they are burnt out in their job because call volume has increased and there’s no break for them so that has led to lots of resignations," Paladino said. "It's also led to a decrease in the number of people who actually want to come into the field because who wants to work in the middle of a pandemic? So we’ve lost a lot of people over the last couple of years."
In April, Guilford Emergency Services started its inaugural EMT launchpad program to help with staffing. It allows people who have no medical experience to get trained as an EMT and work for the department.
"In the past, before this academy, we had (to hire) somebody who (already had) their EMT certification, (...) now we have (this) new pool of people we can pull from," said Paladino.
The program has 12 students and another training class is expected to start in September.