HHS Announces Plans to Make $80 Million Available to Support Health IT Workforce

Grants Will Support Community College Training Programs, Curriculum Development, Additional Programs to be Announced in Coming Weeks

Dr. David Blumenthal, HHS' National Coordinator for Health Information Technology, today announced plans to make available $80 million in grants to help develop and strengthen the health information technology workforce. The grants that will be made available include $70 million for community college training programs and $10 million to develop educational materials to support these programs. Both programs will support the immediate need for skilled health information technology (health IT) professionals who will enable the broad adoption and use of health IT throughout the United States.

Authorized by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA), the grants are the first in a series of programs to help strengthen and support the health IT workforce. Additional details regarding the grant programs for these and other key resource and training areas will be
announced over the next several weeks.

"Ensuring the adoption of electronic health records (EHRs), information exchange among health care providers and public health authorities, and redesign of workflows within health care settings all depend on having a qualified pool of workers," Dr. Blumenthal said. "The expansion of a highly skilled workforce developed through these programs will help health care providers and hospitals implement and maintain EHRs and use them to strengthen delivery of care."

The Community College program will establish intensive, non-degree training that can be completed in six months or less by individuals with some background in either health care or IT fields. Participating colleges will coordinate their efforts through five regional consortia that span the nation. Graduates of this training will fill a variety of roles that both assist health care practices during the critical process of deploying IT systems and support these practices on an ongoing basis.

The curriculum development program will make high quality educational materials available to the community colleges so these training programs can be established quickly to meet these workforce needs.

Any U.S. non-profit institution of higher learning currently engaged in providing training in health IT that is interested in drafting curriculum or establishing a consortium that includes community colleges may apply for the grants. Information about grant applications will be
available shortly at http://healthIT.HHS.gov/HITECHgrants.

"Critical to achieving the goal of the Heath Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act and supporting meaningful use of health IT is the availability of a skilled workforce that understands the unique technology and management needs within a clinical setting," added Dr. Blumenthal. "These newly funded programs are designed to equip the most qualified and advanced IT workforce in the world with the tools they need to modernize our health system."

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Georgia Tech to Transform Unemployed Technology Workers into High School Computing Teachers

(BUSINESS WIRE)--In today’s economy, unemployment rates have spiked and out-of-work professionals are forced to either join the thousands looking for jobs or seek new career paths. Through a recent $2.5 million grant from the National Science Foundation, the Georgia Tech College of Computing will mitigate the stress of joblessness for unemployed information technology (IT) professionals over the next three years. Operation Reboot, as the project is aptly titled, will transform an initial set of 30 IT workers in Georgia into high school computing teachers. The initiative began September 1.

Operation Reboot will combine Georgia Tech's innovative high school computing teacher training program and the successful Georgia Teacher Alternative Preparation Program (GaTAPP) to pair an IT worker with an existing computing teacher. They will co-teach at least two computing classes for one year, allowing the IT professional to learn the ins and outs of a classroom and the teacher to get an education in IT. Simultaneously, the IT worker will receive an initial teaching certificate and a computer science endorsement, a special area of expertise for teachers to add on to their certification.

“A teacher's motivation, self efficacy, job satisfaction and commitment to teaching are closely linked with their professional identity,” Barbara Ericson, Director of Computing Outreach at the College of Computing and principal investigator for Operation Reboot, said. “Through the teacher workshops at Georgia Tech, courses needed for certification, co-teaching and mentoring we will transform these IT worker's identity into that of a computing teacher.”

Operation Reboot ultimately aims to improve the computing education of 4,600 students over the next three years by increasing the number of well trained computing teachers and the number of computing classes being offered. By creating highly engaging curricular materials, improving the content and educational knowledge of computing teachers, Georgia Tech expects the number of students receiving a computing education to increase by at least 30 percent. This is especially important for the economy and students interested in computing careers, as jobs in the field are expected to be some of the fastest growing through 2016.

With computing a critical component of every American business, the need for innovative, skilled IT professionals is more vital than ever. The demand for IT professionals, as predicted by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, is not currently being met by computer science enrollments in American universities and the United States still faces a tough challenge in remaining competitive in overall science and technology education.

Georgia Tech will publish results of the project and share materials with other states to serve as a model on how to successfully transform unemployed IT workers into high school computing teachers.

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ComputerTraining.com at Galleria and Norcross Now Offering up to $250,000 in Scholarship Funds

/PRNewswire/ -- The field of information technology is one of the few sectors of the employment market that is slated to grow over the next few years, according to the U.S. Department of Labor. For anyone recently laid off or looking to make a career change into the IT field, now is the time. The Galleria and Norcross campuses of ComputerTraining.com are pleased to announce that they now have $250,000 in scholarship funds available to eligible applicants.

ComputerTraining.com offers a unique, hands-on training approach in a supportive environment to students from all walks of life. The Galleria and Norcross campuses offer students effective and affordable instructor-led technology training in a supportive, hands-on environment. With an accelerated Microsoft Certification program, career services and first-class Microsoft Certified Instructors, ComputerTraining.com provides students with the education and knowledge necessary to get certified and find career success in IT.

"It's very exciting for us to be able to offer scholarships to eligible applicants," says Chuck Lang, President of ComputerTraining.com. "We know times are tough everywhere, and we're so happy that we can offer scholarships to prospective students, enabling them to complete our program and start a new, rewarding career in Information Technology."

In as little as six months, ComputerTraining.com students can be fully certified and ready to begin a new career in a booming industry.

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Georgia Southern University College of Information Technology Offers Students High-Demand Certificate

Georgia Southern University College of Information Technology students are not only graduating with a competitive edge, but saving employers thousands of dollars in the process. Georgia Southern is one of the rare universities in the country, and the only in the state of Georgia, that includes a SAP® Certificate as part of its curriculum. This provides a major competitive edge for graduates as they begin their job search.

SAP AG, headquartered in the EU (Waldorf, Germany) and is the third largest software enterprise in the world in terms of revenues. SAP is currently used by more than 35,000 companies and with new products targeting small and medium enterprises. Its customer base is projected to include more than 100,000 companies by 2010. Other institutions that award a SAP Certificate include the University of Southern California, Louisiana State University and the University of Central Florida to name a few. Only a handful of other institutions in the U.S. offer an equivalent number of SAP-approved courses and have a comparable level of SAP integration in their curriculum.

“Being able to include a SAP Certificate as part of Georgia Southern’s curriculum provides students with hands-on experience with SAP products and solutions that are used by thousands of the world’s major companies,” said Tom Case, professor and chair, Information Systems Department in the College of Information Technology at Georgia Southern University. “The state of Georgia serves as the corporate headquarters for numerous corporations that are heavy users of SAP including Coca Cola, Georgia Pacific, Home Depot and Newell Rubbermaid. Our SAP Certificate gives students a true competitive edge in the marketplace and provides SAP user organizations with a valued pool of SAP-experienced talent that is rarely found in recent university graduates.”

Georgia Southern has partnered with SAP’s University Alliance to enable students to use and understand SAP products. Through hands-on experience with SAP solutions, students gain insight into how SAP and other enterprise solutions can empower a business to optimize key processes such as accounting and controlling, human capital management, materials management, and sales and distribution. Students who complete three SAP-approved courses are eligible to receive a SAP Certificate signed by SAP America. Information Systems majors in the Enterprise Resources Planning Emphasis typically receive this certificate as part of their normal course work. The SAP Certificate may also be earned by undergraduate and post-baccalaureate students who minor in Information Systems.

“Employers would typically have to spend significant amounts of money to provide an employee with a comparable SAP skill-base as that obtained by students who earn our SAP Certificate,” said Case. “We are one of the few universities in the country using SAP this extensively and we are receiving a lot of interest from prospective students and working professionals. Our graduates are in high demand and many are receiving multiple job offers with major companies.” In the past two years, BMW, Georgia Pacific, and UnderArmour are just a few of the companies that have come to campus to recruit Georgia Southern students pursuing their SAP Certificate. Georgia Southern students have also completed SAP internships at IBM, JCB, Shell and ZEP.

Georgia Southern is currently working with Coldwater Creek, headquartered in Boise, Idaho, to establish an ongoing relationship to help the company satisfy its demand for new workers with SAP skills. David Edwards, divisional vice president for Business and Technology Alignment at Coldwater Creek says, “We are working directly with Georgia Southern University because they not only recognize our needs, but are preparing their students to be immediate contributors once they graduate. In today's challenging business environment, the ability to recruit students that already have hands-on SAP experience is a major cost savings."

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Georgia Southern University College of Information Technology One of Ten VMware Academies in the World to Teach Virtualization

Georgia Southern University’s College of Information Technology, the only one of its kind in the Southeast United States, is now one of only 10 universities in the world to teach the cutting-edge technology of virtualization on VMware software, thanks to VMware and a donation of computer equipment by Corus Consulting and Canvas Systems.

Corus Consulting and Canvas Systems values the equipment at $126,000 but professors in the College of Information Technology said it is hard to put a price on what the donation will add to an IT student’s education and career potential long term.

“With the equipment from Corus Consulting and Canvas Systems, our students will now have access to an educational experience that not many in the world have today,” said Timur Mirzoev, Ph.D. who is already using the donated equipment in two of his IT classes this semester. “We now have x86-based and UNIX servers, FC, iSCSI networked storage, switches, firewalls, VolP and much more dedicated specifically to education. We believe that this type of experience will give our graduates an additional competitive edge when they start their job search in an already in-demand field.”

The new equipment is being used to teach virtualization, which allows one server to host multiple virtual computers without the loss of their purpose or function. In addition, virtualization is changing the way businesses deploy and manage resources, simplifying and speeding IT response.

Designated a VMware Academy, Georgia Southern University’s College of Information Technology may teach VMware courses and certify students as Virtualization Certified Professionals. This certification saves future employers thousands of dollars in training costs and makes Georgia Southern graduates much more competitive in the job market. The designation as a VMware Academy was one of the key elements that impressed executives with Corus Consulting and Canvas Systems and prompted the computer equipment donation.

“Georgia Southern University’s College of Information Technology is now not only unique to Georgia and the Southeast, but the world. We wanted to work with an institution that was both innovative and a leader in IT education. Being one of only 10 VMware Academies in the world is an outstanding accomplishment for Georgia Southern and shows their commitment to preparing outstanding IT professionals,” said Brian Hoffman, Managing Director of Technology Services for Corus Consulting and Canvas Systems.

“Georgia Southern graduates will posses hands on skills with industry leading technologies that very few IT students in the world have – including many graduates of the most respected universities in the world. These graduates will be productive employees on day one.”

According to Mirzoev, virtualization will ultimately save money, make computer systems perform more efficiently and allow for fast data and resources recovery in case of a disaster. Mirzoev says 90 percent of businesses in the world will virtualize their computer systems within the next five years. Many U.S. government agencies already require disaster recovery plans that rely extensively on virtualization technologies. But because only 10 universities in the world teach VMware technology, Georgia Southern University’s College of Information Technology graduates will be in great demand. “As a University, our goal is to be one of the leaders in this field,” says Mirzoev.

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