If you’ve ever needed help recovering from an injury, the odds are good that you’ve worked with a physical therapist and their assistant(s) to speed up that recovery process. With people living and staying active longer, Physical Therapy Assistants (PTA) are one of the fastest-growing fields in healthcare. Shasta College’s new Physical Therapy Assistant Program (PTA) just graduated 16 PTA students this semester—the first-ever graduating class from this new program to help fill the need for trained PTAs in the north state. In conjunction with the graduation, the program also received full accreditation from the Commission on Accreditation in Physical Therapy Education (CAPTE), allowing students to sit for their license exam.
“I’m so proud of this first class of ‘trail blazers’,” said Marcee Martinez, Program Director for Shasta College’s PTA Program. “We’ve learned so much together, and this program is richer for their input, dedication, and commitment. Receiving accreditation justifies all of our efforts over the last two years, and it ensures that our students can sit for their licensure”, Martinez explained. “We are so fortunate that Shasta College offers (full-time) students two years of free tuition, enabling many in our program to graduate with far less student debt than other pathways available. Plus, their units are fully transferrable should they choose to go on and pursue higher degrees,” Martinez said.
The PTA program at Shasta College consists of two full-time faculty and 11 part-time faculty members who train cohorts of 24 students over five semesters. All faculty members continue to practice in the industry to ensure students receive the training that the industry and employers request. Students are required to take Anatomy, Physiology, Medical Terminology, and Introduction to Physical Therapy Professions as prerequisites before entering the program. Over 60 clinical sites that offer Physical Therapy across the north state have partnered with Shasta College to provide students with the clinical hours needed to earn their degree. The accrediting body CAPTE requires the first class to go through the entire program and provides the ultimate decision in their final semester on whether to give accreditation to the program. Two other cohorts have already started or are in the process of starting the program. The application window for the annual January start is September 1 – October 1 of each year.
For more information about the program go to our website at www.shastacollege.edu/pta or to find out how to enroll for the next cohort, please contact Marcee Martinez at mmartinez@shastacollege.edu or call her at (530) 339-3629.
