BNSI Summer Enrichment Program

Helping Bilingual Students to Make the Grade…

For the past three summers bilingual high school students from Har-Ber, Springdale and Siloam Springs have opted to take the Summer Enrichment Program (SEP)instead of working or going on vacation. They participate in three weeks of intensive instruction. For a total of 60 instructional hours and another 25 to 50 practice hours these students, with an interest in making nursing a career, work to enhance their test taking skills so that they can qualify for nursing school admissions tests.

Each day from 8 AM to noon thirty-six student participate in alternating Language/Writing, Math or test taking classes taught by Shay Lastra (Language) or Darryl Irvin (Math).  Both teachers have a
history of providing quality education to students from other cultures.  Each day they work intensively to improve student skills. In addition to the classroom instruction, SEP students are expected to participate in online tutorial programs.  Each of the rotating classes is held at Northwest Technical Institute in classrooms with a computer for each of the 18 students in that class.  The atmosphere is relaxed, yet intense because this is serious work to become the first in their family to be a nurse.

SEP is funded by a CARE Foundation grant.  Over 100 students have completed this “boot camp for nursing”.  The current thirty-six will likely increase their testing scores on average by 18 to 35 points. SEP continues to help students gain both proficiency and confidence in the English and test taking skills.

All nursing entrance exams are in English, online and timed.  Without the SEP experience nursing school candidates have experienced disappointments when they did not have the skills to compete in a highly competitive nursing school admissions environment.

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