Signs of Life: Jordan Campus

Parts of Salt Lake Community College are slowly beginning to reopen during the COVID-19 pandemic, ushering in a "new normal" in a community that normally thrives on unfettered access to the environment and resources that make SLCC one of the top community colleges in the nation. Signs of Life is a series that shines a light on stops along the long road back to normal operations.

 

First it was the migraine headaches that put off Marlee McKean’s college career.

 

Marlee had struggled with the debilitating headaches in high school. Stress sometimes causes them, she says. When she started at a four-year school, the new environment and huge class sizes were too much for her. She tried working with advisors at the school, but modifications to her schedule that might have allowed her to continue were not available. The stress and resulting headaches were a one-two punch that knocked her out of Round One of college.

 

Not one to give up, the 25-year-old Salt Lake City resident looked around, heard great things about Salt Lake Community College and decided to give it a try. “I came here, and everyone was super nice and accommodating,” Marlee says. “It’s like a community. I like how small it is. You know everyone. I feel like the teachers actually know me and I am getting the feedback I need.”

 

Inspired by parents who were both nurses and by a doctor who was finally able to help Marlee gain some control over the headaches, she decided to go into nursing. At the beginning of 2020, Marlee was on her way toward completing the Certified Nursing Assistant program at SLCC’s Jordan Campus.

Candace Williams (left) and Christine Klamm watch as CNA student Marlee McKean demonstrates skills.

And then the COVID-19 pandemic hit. SLCC, like other colleges, went to remote learning in as many areas as possible, but some hands-on, in-person labs had to be temporarily shuttered, including the Certified Nursing Assistant program. Marlee continued full time as a nanny, waiting for the moment when restrictions would ease enough for her to return to in-person labs on campus.

 

When students were allowed back, everyone was in full PPE gear (personal protective equipment) – masks, gowns, gloves – and instructors had to sit in the hall while students demonstrated required skills before passing off to the next level of study. “It was a big change for us,” says Candace Williams, an associate professor in the nursing program. Regulated by the Utah Nursing Assistant Registry, hands-on, in-person clinicals at outside facilities have for now been replaced by passing off on skills in front of Candace and her colleagues. These days, with the state in the yellow “low-risk” phase, that means Candace can be in the same room as students, and everyone wears masks without requiring full PPE.

Dressed in shorts and a thin hoodie on a warm June day, Marlee works with the mannequin “Mr. Smith” on several skills, like helping him transfer from a hospital bed to a wheelchair – it’s a lot more complicated than it looks. After this summer, she plans on applying to SLCC’s nursing program, not wanting to put it off if she isn’t forced to by the pandemic and a state return to an orange moderate-risk phase. “I just want to get to something I enjoy doing,” she says. “I want to get out there and do what I want to do.”

 

For now, her new normal also includes getting Botox injections at 15-20 sites on her face, neck and back every three months to help control the headaches. She would even like to someday work for the doctor who finally cracked the code on Marlee’s migraine mystery. “I have appreciated the care I’ve received,” she says. “That really helped me decide on a career. I want to help people, to give back. I want to make sure people feel safe and taken care of.”