I attended my first meeting as part of the Program Advisory Committee for Remington College, a local industrial school. It was at the least educational. What it also was, was very interesting.
What Remington does is ask people who work in the fields of the careers that they prepare people for to come in, look at their programs, make comments, and offer advice. It helps them prepare programs that will get students through what they need to after graduation so that they can pass testing and start working in the field.
After a brief overview of the college and how it works, I was taken to a classroom to talk with the director of education and the senior massage program instructor. They showed me the books they are using, the courses, the objectives, and facilities. It was very interesting. I would have loved to go to a school like this when I took massage training. They have a lending library as well as a computer lab. (One of the things they do is push computer skills which most massage therapists seem to be lacking. They also have classes in business training to teach them what it is like to run a business.)
I found the whole thing to be quite impressive. The facilities are really nice, and they seem to have a good balance of classes. They also had a good bit of equipment in each classroom to help with teaching other subjects such as hydrotherapy.
I told them that I liked what I saw. What I saw them lacking was more class time on Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM). All too much lately, the questions on the national test have too much to do with TCM. Most people that get a lot of those types of questions tend to fail. I haven’t seen any school yet that teaches enough to pass the national exam. They gladly wrote down those suggestions and will be sending them up to corporate as this is a school that has branches in many states, and their curriculum comes down from corporate headquarters.
They asked how I thought people like me could help in other ways. I told them it might be good to have us come in and talk for an hour or so to a class to tell them what it is like in the real world. The teachers tell the students, but that tends to go in one ear and out the other. Maybe if someone like me (or the other people on the committee) came in, it might make an impact.
But it was a good couple of hours, and I felt like I actually contributed something. So yes, it was worth it.