There is going to be a second intake of Assiniboine Community College's (ACC) Practical Nursing Program at the newly opened rural rotating site in Morden. ACC confirmed the news earlier this week. 

The ribbon was cut on the site in January with the first intake of students taking their seats that same week. 

Mayor Brandon Burley was pleased to hear the news. 

"We recognize the value of the nursing program that has been located here. It's exciting to see students working, often late into the night, at the facility. We're enthusiastic about the potential to continue this program and offer more residents to further their education, and provide quality jobs and job training."

With Boundary Trails Health Centre just down the road, Burley agreed having the program in Morden is an asset.

"Training in-place is vitally important in certain sectors, in particular, nursing," he said. "People who go to locations to train tend not to come back and that's a problem for our region. And so, there's an increase chance that, by training here, our students will stay here."

“Offering training closer to home means people living in rural communities have more choice when pursuing post-secondary education, and this Practical Nursing program in Morden will enable more nurses to be trained to fill the on-going demand,” said Manitoba Advanced Education and Training Minister, Sarah Guillemard. “As we work to fulfill our commitment to add 400 new nursing seats to meet Manitoba’s health sector needs, this program also complements our health human resource action plan to retain, train and recruit more nurses and the implementation of our government’s Skills, Training and Knowledge Strategy.”

“This area of the province is growing, and we're proud to not only offer access to opportunities for students, but also to help answer the call for increasing healthcare needs,” said Mark Frison, President at Assiniboine. “The college continues to be responsive to the labour market and community needs, and rural rotating nursing sites are an important way of achieving that. Thanks to the community, the province and the health region for the continued support in ensuring we can offer training to future nurses close to home.”

The demand for Assiniboine nursing graduates continues to be high; 100 per cent of practical nursing graduates surveyed from the 2021-22 academic year said they had jobs, making on average more than $57,000 a year.

Applications for Morden’s Practical Nursing site are now open. Applications will be assessed and admitted on an ongoing basis, with those living within 100 km of Morden and/or within the Southern Health Santé-Sud Region being given priority. Important updates, information, and checklists for prospective applicants can be found here. (assiniboine.net/nursing)

~With files from Robyn Wiebe~

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