Are you familiar with the Montana Digital Academy (MDTA) for high school students? MTDA is specifically designed to provide unique educational opportunities to Montana students and schools. The MTDA even has HEALTH SCIENCE coursework available! You can review their course catalog online www.montanadigitalacademy.org.

Once you've opened their course catalog, scroll down the page to Career and Technical Education and Health Occupations is one of the choices. This course is free of charge, one semester long, and will help you explore what it means to be a health care professional.

If you are sure you'd like to pursue a two-year associate's degree in a health profession, dual credit and college credit only courses such as College Writing, College Algebra, Medical Terminology, Intro to Psychology and Intro to Nursing-all pre-requisite courses for many health professions. Dual credit courses allow you to take college level coursework for ½ the cost of college tuition and you can have these courses completed before you even graduate high school! College credit courses are offered to high school students, but they are full price.

If you would like to explore health careers or get a jump on your college plans, you can do this from any school in Montana!

The Western Montana AHEC office is proud to sponsor a Public Service Announcement Contest to be held the week of April 1st in accordance with National Public Health Week. The contest is open to any 9th-11th grade students within the Western AHEC region.The winning video will be awarded a state of the art Celestron Microscope with LCD display for group viewing, digital camera to save images, and 100 prepared microscope slides for their current school. The objective of this contest is to encourage students to look at public health careers as careers of interest through researching, developing, and creating a 30 to 60 second public service announcement in video format that will demonstrate an understanding of the broad array of issues and topics covered in public health. Students may choose from the following topics:

• Ensuring a Safe, Healthy Home for Your Family
• Providing a Healthy Environment for Children at School
• Protecting You While You're on The Move
• Empowering a Healthy Community 

PSAs may not contain copyrighted material . Deadline for submissions is March 19th, 2013. Contact anna.buckner@mso.umt.edu with any questions or go to  www.wmtahec.org for more information.  

The North Central AHEC office will be releasing their 2nd Annual Public Service Announcement application on February 1, 2013. The objective of this contest is to encourage students to look at public health careers as careers of interest by working with local, county health departments to identify and expose the student's interest in healthcare careers, helping to minimize the impeding healthcare professions shortage.  As part of the application process, students are to interview their local public health department staff and investigate career explorations in the public health industry while determining a pertinent health issues affecting their local community. The students are to develop a 30 to 60 second public service announcement on the health issue of their choice. This contest is open to high school students within the North Central AHEC region.

The judgment criteria included the following:

- demonstration of knowledge obtained from public health department

The winner of the PSA contest will be receiving a state of the art, Celestron LCD microscope with a digital, built-in camera and an accompanying set of 100 anatomy microscope slides for their school!  Applications will be available on the NC MT AHEC website:  www.ncmtahec.org 

NC AHEC will be at the Healthcare Career Workshop on February 12, 2013 in Heritage Hall at Great Falls College- Montana State University. The goal of the Healthcare Career Workshop is to expose high school students to the variety of healthcare professions and the importance of enrolling in math and science classes during their high school careers. There will be roughly 150 high school students meeting with multiple healthcare professionals during the "Medical Rounds" session from 10:15am - noon; and from 1:00-2:45 during the afternoon session, there will be a new set of 150 students completing their "Medical Rounds." Stop by the NC AHEC booth for hands on activities and to learn more about healthcare careers in Montana!  

The North Central AHEC will be at the following Tribal College Fairs in February:

Tuesday, February 12th at Blackfeet Community College, 11:00 - 2:00 

Wednesday, February 13th at Stone Child College, 11:00 - 2:00 

Thursday, February 14th at Aaniiih' Nakoda College 

Stop by the NC AHEC booth to learn more about post-secondary educational opportunities available in Montana!