SW Kansas News

Seward County Community College recently purchased three ventilators for its respiratory therapy program with funding through a grant by the Patterson Family Foundation.  

The funding, which was approximately $80,000, allowed the college to purchase three more ventilators to use in the classroom.  

According to Janae Zachary, program director for respiratory therapy at SCCC, students will have the opportunity to receive more individual attention when using a ventilator.   

“It allows our students to have a one on one (student to ventilator experience),” Zachary said, adding that the new equipment is also an upgrade in technology, which will help out with distance learning.  

“… the ventilators have HDMI so I can teach (distance learning) with it through our computer system,” she said. “When you try to zoom in a camera on a ventilator screen it’s scrambled, jumbled and blurry. With the HDMI, students can see real-time on my screen and I can share that (clearly).”  

The Patterson Family Foundation, based out of Kansas City, Mo., is a family-led foundation extending the legacy of Neal and Jeanne Patterson, which strives to help rural communities through health care, education, economic opportunity, and beyond.   

According to its website, the Patterson Family Foundation was “established to reinvest in rural communities and cultivate values of education and hard work for current and future generations.”  

“Advancing health care, education, and strengthening communities, particularly in rural areas,” is a mission for the foundation.  

Zachary heard about Patterson Family Foundation while visiting a clinical site during the Spring semester. After doing some research, she felt that the College and program’s mission fit all the criteria of what the Patterson Family Foundation was looking for in granting funds.   

Zachary was extremely grateful for the funding and believed the college and program’s mission were a perfect match for the Patterson Family Foundation.  

“The value of the funds provided by the Patterson Family Foundation to the SCCC RT program for these ventilator purchases is invaluable” and emphasized that it “will be put to good use in educating the current and future respiratory care students at SCCC”.    

“We have to be able to teach our students on these ventilators for them to take care of people that need to be on them,” she continued. 

Original source can be found here.