(Eureka)—Sixteen local high school students, exploring careers in health fields graduated from the Health Career Exploration Summer Institute (HESI) on Wednesday, June 30, in a ceremony that was the culmination of a three-week summer education program.

The HESI was conducted by the Humboldt County Office of Education’s (HCOE) Education at Work Initiative. Graduation ceremonies were live-streamed on the HCOE YouTube channel. The ceremony marked the return of the successful program after it was postponed in 2020.

The HESI program is designed to give students exposure to some of the various career paths available in the healthcare industry. Student participants explored health careers and gained knowledge about the local health care industry. The series of courses were taught by HCOE instructors with the partnerships of St. Joseph Health, the Humboldt County Workforce Development Board and College of the Redwoods.

The HESI students experienced a variety of medical perspectives in the HCOE classroom and field trips to the Northern California Community Blood Bank and Cal-Ore Life Flight locations, where segments of the curriculum were taught. Guest speakers and industry professionals were brought in to talk about careers as nurses, lab technicians, and more, and students participated in hands-on activities such as suturing, applying tourniquets, giving shots. Upon completion, students were awarded certificates.

The HESI program is just one component of Education at Work’s Health Careers Exploration Project (HCEP) at the Humboldt County Office of Education. Learn more about all of our programs at https://hcoe.org/education-at-work.

For illustrative purposes for video or print/digital please feel free to use b-roll footage or images from our website of this event at https://hcoe.org/hesi/ .