Nursing students use one of the manikins during a class.
Pickaway-Ross Adult Education is benefiting greatly from RAPIDS grants and that funding leads to better learning experiences for Adult Education students.
The RAPIDS (Regionally Aligned Priorities in Delivering Skills) program provides campuses such as Pickaway-Ross with funding to purchase necessary training equipment.
Most recently, funding was used to upgrade the simulation lab with a SimServeRx Medication Dispensing Cabinet and Supply Cabinet by 3AM Technologies. This dispensing system is used in most hospital settings.
Avonia Dearth, Adult Education Health Programming coordinator, said the system will prepare nursing students for jobs as well as help students in the Pharmacy Technician program.
"The main reason these systems were set up is that in past years medication errors were a big issue, not only with nursing but with pharmacy," Avonia said. "So we're trying to get our simulation lab to be more equipped and more realistic to what a hospital setting is."
Avonia said the sim lab is an ongoing project. In 2016 the school purchased its first mannequin simulator — Apollo. It is a male but it can transition into a female. Two years ago, a birthing manikin, Lucina, and a sim newborn, joined the lab.
In addition to the sim lab purchases, RAPIDS grant funding has paid for a burn building for the Public Safety programs and new computers for the IT training lab.