To the surprise of their new teacher and the administration, the Certified Nursing Assistant class achieved a 100% passing rate on their final test. The students received their certificates later into 3rd term and are now eligible for working at clinics.

“When they trained me for this job,” said the educator, Mrs. Staheli. “They said, ‘You might not get as good of scores because you’re a brand new teacher.’ I thought that maybe a few wouldn’t pass, but… I was just blown away. ‘What?’ I looked at [the scores] like five times. ‘Is this real?’”

During her clinical instructorship in this nursing program Staheli discovered something about herself while teaching Bonneville High School. “I knew, right then, that I wanted to go into teaching,” said Staheli. “I made that my goal, then this job opened, [and] I was referred from the CNA teachers at Weber County.” Thanks to her experiences as a practicing nurse, she uses these memories to make the class a more enjoyable situation. She is not currently a practicing nurse in order to put all her focus into second semester’s class.

Her first choice in a school was Layton High, where she taught Medical Anatomy and Physiology. She kept in contact with her high school CNA teacher and later assisted her as Staheli was going through nursing school. That same teacher helped her get employed at Davis. Staheli said, “I haven’t been to Layton for very long, but every time I come back to Davis I feel like this is my home.”

Unbeknownst to the faculty, Dave King, the CTE coordinator, announced the test score at one of their morning meetings. When the room was being cleared out, the teachers told the new CNA instructor “Good job” on their way to the door.

Staheli feels that it wasn’t her who helped the students out entirely, but she said that it was their drive for success, “the thing that they really wanted, that extra oomph to get through the class.” These same ambitious students are already looking for jobs in many different areas. “I had one that asked me to be a reference on her CNA job that she applied for,” said Staheli, “and she got it. It’s cool to see my students growing and getting out in the healthcare field and actually working.”

Staheli’s teacher assistant, senior Mikelle Ford received her CNA certificate and is now looking for work at the Legacy Village of Layton rehabilitation center. Although the class prepared her in many aspects of assisted living, this job would be ideal for her desire to do something related to physical therapy. “I don’t like seeing the dying process, and that’s something that you see a lot in nursing homes,” said Ford. “I’d rather help people get better than maintaining them until they eventually pass.”

With two grandmothers in nursing homes Ford didn’t know what the CNAs would be doing with the patients, and this class helped her better understand what was happening. Even though she saw most of it as “common knowledge,” she enjoyed the atmosphere of the course. “I could tell that [Staheli] was hesitant at first, but as she started getting into it she was really good,” said Ford. “I like having an instructor that knows what they’re talking about. You can tell that she loves what she does, which is fun because it makes you love it even more.”

This class required the students to take notes during 3rd period, and then come back and apply the skills they learned in 4th period. If not on campus, students could either be at clinicals, where they could watch and evaluate CNAs in the real world, or they would be studying and researching on their own. In preparation for the final exam, they also participated in group tests and games that turned the class into an activity.

“All of the hard work will pay off in the long run,” said Ford. “Even though it seems like it’s stupid or dumb, it’s all for a reason and you don’t really see it until you go to clinicals and start using those skills. It makes me happy… I accomplished what I wanted to do, [and] now I can get a job as a CNA.”

Because Staheli believes that “this class has just as much ambition to pass this test as my last class,” she is deciding what the goal should be for the test in May. Until then the state won’t let her know the specific questions on the written and skills portions of the exam, but she is given objectives that the class can follow.