If Long Beach and northern Orange County seem more relaxed than usual, it may be because Glenda Walker and her American Career College students have been offering so many helping hands.

In the last couple of months, Walker’s students in ACC’s massage therapy program have fanned out to numerous community events near the school’s Anaheim campus, offering free massages in forums that have ranged from a Teacher Appreciation Day at Anaheim’s Loara High School to a Make A Wish Foundation fundraiser in Irvine to the Long Beach Grand Prix.

“It brings an awareness to our program,” says Walker, who is massage therapy program director at ACC’s Anaheim campus. “It shows people that massage is a viable way for them to maintain their health and support themselves when they have injuries. And people love it.”

For example, she says, when 29 of her students volunteered last month to treat the Federally Employed Women at Long Beach Veterans’ Hospital to free massages, 119 people showed up. In February, massage therapy students sacrificed their own “student appreciation day” to collect teddy bears for patients at Long Beach Children’s Hospital.

“People are always so impressed by our students’ professionalism, and always ask for their business cards,” Walker says. At Loara High School, she says, several ACC students who had grown up in the area got to give massages to their old high school teachers this month, “and the activities director said he’d need gotten so many thank you notes.”

Walker, who was named to her current post in January, says she’s looking ahead now to more volunteer events for the students, including some for cancer patients.

“It will help our students learn empathy and nurturing,” she says, “and I think the patients will get a lot out of it, too.”

“This was a win-win for all participants and a way for us to pay tribute to nurses in our own way during their week of national recognition,” said Charles Celeste, Director of ACC’s Massage Therapy program. “It was gratifying for our students to be able to give them a 10-15 minute escape from their busy, stressful work.”

Each year, National Nurse’s Week celebrates the profession and all the work nurses do. The week begins on May 6, National Nurses Day, and runs through May 12, the birthday of Florence Nightingale, the founder of modern nursing.

“It was a privilege for our Massage Therapy students to be a part of National Nurse’s Week,” said Tom McNamara, President of American Career College. “These kinds of experiences help them to graduate with confidence as they prepare to enter a dynamic profession projected to grow rapidly over the next several years.”

ACC’s massage therapy students enroll in a 720-hour modular program that encompasses multiple facets of the massage industry to prepare than as entry-level therapists. Students learn Swedish, deep tissue, and Shiatsu methods; spa and sports treatments; non-traditional bodywork and treatments for special needs populations; and business, ethics and professional training. The program teaches anatomy, physiology, kinesiology and pathophysiology as they relate to massage, in order to provide students with a basic understanding of the body, how dysfunctions occur, and how these relate to each subject.

About American Career College
American Career College (ACC) is a health care educator with four campuses located in Southern California. Founded by David Pyle (www.davidapyle.com) over 35 years ago, ACC offers students a comprehensive array of high-quality educational programs which prepare graduates for a challenging and rewarding career in health care. For more information, visit www.americancareercollege.edu.

Contacts
American Career College
Celia Ffrench
Vice President of Marketing
949-783-4080

It was just an aside in a lesson on eye muscles and seizures, but after class, student after student came up to tell him about some instance of epilepsy in their family. Those conversations gave Mirzabegian—who has been involved in epilepsy awareness since the birth of Emily, his 9-year-old daughter—an idea that has turned into an annual classroom seminar.

“Every March 26, which is Epilepsy Awareness Day, I set aside a half-hour,” says Mirzabegian. “I ask students, ‘Suppose the person next to you were to have a seizure? What would you do?’”

Most people, he says, are unaware that the best First Aid is to roll the person onto their side, cushion their head, make sure they can breathe—and then time them. “Seizures often look very scary, but they’re not that bad if they’re less than five minutes, and often the person will get back up and continue with that they were doing,” he says.

That information and more was presented last month to some four dozen faculty and students on ACC’s Los Angeles campus, where Mirzabegian’s Etalk has become an annual observance: “We all wore purple in honor of Epilepsy Awareness Day,” says Kari Cheevers, ACC program director for optical dispensing. “It was phenomenal.”

“Obviously, this is a medically oriented college, and any First Aid awareness is good,” says Mirzabegian. But, he added, so is awareness of a neurological disorder that, according to the Epilepsy Foundation, affects some 2.2 million Americans and is more prevalent than autism spectrum disorder, cerebral palsy, multiple sclerosis and Parkinson’s disease put together.

“Every time I do the session, students come up to tell me their personal stories,” he says. “It’s a very common condition, but rarely spoken about.”

“A local football player had died at the end of a game because of an underlying heart condition,” recalls Wayne A. Walls, director of clinical education in the respiratory therapy program at American Career College’s Orange County campus. “It was tragic, and the hospital was reaching out to the high school. George Garcia, the hospital’s regional director of cardiopulmonary, asked me to send some of our students to help do EKGs and gather patient information. It was so successful that it became an annual event.”

Walls says that outreach, in response to the 2009 death of 17-year-old Kevin Telles, inspired both him and his students, and left him wondering: What if volunteerism could be built into the curriculum?

“That sense of community service is a value we try to instill in students as being part of a noble profession,” Walls says. “Also the job market is very competitive—employers tell me that when they see community service on an application, they pull those students to the top of the deck.”

Since that first event, he says, he has started each 10-week term by circulating a list of a half-dozen or more volunteer opportunities in health care. Students can use them, he says, to earn extra credit or augment clinical hours.

“We’ve gone out with the mobile health van at St. Mary’s Medical Center in Long Beach, and to health fairs at the Westminster Community Center, we do activities with the American Association of Respiratory Care and the California Association of Respiratory Care.” Most recently, Walls’ students volunteered at the American Lung Association Fight for Air Climb in Los Angeles and rallied support for legislation curbing secondhand smoke in apartment buildings.

“Ultimately, it’s all about the patients—it’s a great feeling to help someone who has difficulty breathing,” he says.​

The foundations acknowledged our ACC students for their professionalism and were very grateful for their contribution. The students enjoyed the event as well, and gained valuable experience working with others in their field and providing optical services to the public.  The Illumination Foundation was excited to invite ACC students to return for future events and we are looking forward to partnering this organization in the future!

Way to go, ACC!

Thank you for everyone who participated in this event!

Great job, Marcial!

In support of the AB 746 bill, ACC students educated and asked people at the event to sign postcards that would later be sent to California’s State Capitol in Sacramento. The AB 746 bill prohibits smoking in multifamily housing and would protect women, infants, and children from the harmful effects of secondhand smoke exposure.

In all, our students obtained around 200 signed postcards, and the American Lung Association was very grateful for our efforts.

Our students got a chance to meet with 2008′s The Biggest Loser winner, Ali Vincent (pictured below)!

Thank you to everyone who took part in this wonderful cause!

 

Call us now at 888-400-4974 to learn more about ACC’s Massage Therapy program! You can also visit http://americancareercollege.edu/programs.html to learn about ACC’s 10 health care training programs.