ProMedica grant to fund medical programming at TPS magnet school

A $100,000 ProMedica grant to Toledo Public Schools will help kick start the next stage of the district’s transformation plan by funding medical programming at one Toledo’s magnet high schools.

The funding, announced today at the Toledo Early College High School, is startup money for a planned four-year Science, Technology, Engineering, Math, and Medicine track at the school; the ProMedica grant helps establish the medicine portion of the track. Students who sign up for the track will shadow doctors, nurses, and other health care professionals, will attend professional seminars, and attend summer learning programs, among other elements.

“We are very fortunate to have ProMedica as a partner,” TPS Superintendent Jerome Pecko said.

The medical program will expose students to careers they may have never considered, TECH science teacher Tim Bolin said. Many of the school’s students are underprivileged, and are unaware of the path needed for many careers in medicine.

The Early College school allows students to take 60 credits of college courses through the University of Toledo while in high school. The program is housed at UT’s Scott Park campus.

ProMedica has a vested interest in developing education programs focused on medicine, ProMedica President and CEO Randy Oostra said. The country’s population is aging, and many jobs in the field will remain unfilled without qualified applicants.

Funding permitting, TPS plans to in effect merge TECHS and the Toledo Technology Academy, the district’s technology-based magnet high school housed at the former DeVilbiss High School on Upton Avenue. The two schools would retain their identities, while serving as high schools for a K-12 STEMM school. The elementary portion, planned for unused space at DeVilbiss, would serve as a feeder school into the two schools.

Full implementation largely depends on a National Science Foundation grant TPS seeks; Mr. Pecko said the district survived the first round of the grant process.