Emergency Medical Services Department

Jamie Kennel, Department Chair
Jamie Kennel, Program Director Paramedic Program
Todd Ellingson, Medical Director
Assistant Professors: H. Jarrard, J. Kennel
Instructors: K. Darling, C. Hamper, S. Schmidt, A. Wagner

Degrees Offered

Associate of Applied Science (AAS) in Paramedic (joint degree through Oregon Tech and OHSU).
Bachelor of Science (BS) of Emergency Medical Services Management (joint degree through Oregon Tech and OHSU).

Career Opportunities

The EMS department provides a full spectrum of pre-hospital training programs and degrees, jointly offered by OHSU and Oregon Tech, starting from your very first EMS or general education course all the way through to completing your bachelor’s degree, all created with collaboration from local and national industry leaders including:

Emergency Medical Technician (EMT) Training and Certification
Paramedic Training (AAS degree & Nationally Accredited)
Critical Care Paramedic Training
Community Care Paramedic / Mobile Integrated Health care Training
EMS Management (Bachelor’s degree)

Depending on your career aspirations, graduates find career employment in a variety of settings including ambulance transport agencies, fire and rescue agencies, air-medical transport agencies, medical support for industrial sites, tactical-medical teams, hospitals, and international aid missions, to name just a few.

The EMT and Paramedic program prepares students for entry positions in the pre-hospital medicine profession. Upon successful completion of the program, graduates are eligible to sit for the National Registry examination, which can lead to both national and state certifications.

Accreditation

While all programs at the university are accredited by the Northwest Commission on Colleges and Universities (NWCCU), where it is available and adds value to our students, our EMS programs offer additional programmatic accreditation. The Paramedic program is nationally accredited by The Commission on Accreditation of Allied Health Education Programs (www.caahep.org) upon the recommendation of the Committee on Accreditation of Educational Programs for the Emergency Medical Services Professions (CoAEMSP).

Admission Requirements

All courses offered by the EMS department require only general Oregon Tech admission with one exception: the second year of the Paramedic degree. Due to the large number of applications and relatively limited number of student positions, the second year of the paramedic degree is a competitive application process requiring a separate admissions step, further described on the Oregon Tech website (www.oit.edu/paramedic).

Whether you’re an incoming freshman or preparing to transfer into one of our programs, students have been most successful when they focus and excel in the following three areas:

Strong academic performance overall with an emphasis on science coursework performance
Experience in providing pre-hospital care (e.g. volunteer, intern, BLS transports, etc.) ideally with hands-on direct patient care
Strong customer service experience with the public

All prospective students are encouraged to meet with the EMS department Program Coordinator to review transcripts and develop a customized plan to get started.

Programs

Major