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Rob: Technology is certainly changing everything and no more so
than in the classroom.
Inexpensive digital technology is giving teachers new tools to help
students compete in a global economy while staying right at home.
We begin today in Ringwood, Oklahoma, where an innovative classroom is
literally saving lives.
What is wrong with your brain?
[laughing]
Rob: It's Wednesday night supper at first Baptist Ringwood.
You're Egyptian?
[laughing]
Rob: And Pastor Brian Frable is in his element.
Brian Frable: When you're going through the line tonight, name a city
that's in the bible.
Alright?
Rob: It's no nine-to-five job.
Singing: I get down; he lifts me up.
Rob: And the job duties, pretty diverse.
Singing: I get down; he lifts me up.
Rob: Yet, it's a devotion that extends well past the pulpit.
Singing: I get down; he lifts me up.
Frable: I am a pastor of a small town Baptist church.
I got a call one day, one of my church members was dying, in the process of
dying.
The first responders and the firefighters were doing CPR, and I got
called to the scene because I was the pastor, and because they knew I
would need to be there for the family to comfort them.
And I remember watching the firemen and the first responders do what they
were doing, and my church member ended up passing away anyway.
But I just remember seeing that, and it impacted me how much they were there
for that family in crisis.
It was these first responders, these firemen, who were there when this
man took his last breath, and the family was experiencing death.
And, as a pastor I got called when somebody died, but I never got called
before somebody died, maybe to help them, maybe to comfort them, and so
that really impacted me.
Rob: So when asked to step into a new role, Frable joined the volunteer fire
department.
Frable: In my town, if you are there, if you can just show up, it doesn't matter
what kind of skills you have sometimes, but just being there.
We need warm bodies with pulses just to get to the scene, get equipment to
the scene, just to help out sometimes.
Now that led me to the process of responding to medical calls.
Rob: But that's takes training that living in a small town, with the
responsibilities of a full time job, and six kids, is hard to get.
[sounds in classroom]
Rob: That is until Frable found an EMS class at
CareerTech.
Using distance education technology, Frable and other rural students from
across the state can learn how to save lives without leaving home.
Frable: Long distance learning for me is great, because I don't have to
spend those hours driving, I can spend it in the classroom or with my
family, and that means a lot to me.
Gina Riggs: Because you really don't think about EMS until you need EMS.
Rob: Gina Riggs teaches EMS Training for CareerTech and says
distance education classes help fill a dire need for rural paramedics.
Gina: Eight years ago we graduated one student from our paramedic program, and
we were ready to shut our doors.
And until we started doing distance education we weren't sure we were going
to be able to make it.
So we can do a program and broadcast it from this campus, from Poteau
campus, and we broadcast to Thackerville and Marietta and Drumright and
Tahlequah and Enid, all of those areas.
And we may only have one or two students sitting in class out there.
And so those students would have had to leave their communities to go
drive to another school and to get training where now they can stay in their
local areas, and we broadcast to them.
And then they come in here and do skills, and like we're doing today, the
advanced cardiac skills in real-life situations.
So, it has been a godsend for our program to be able to do this, and broadcast.
Rob: A godsend for the students and the towns they serve.
Frable: I believe God called me to this community, and because I
love this community, I wanted to serve it.
Through EMS, it's opened up a whole new dynamic of serving my community,
because now it's not the Baptist preacher showing up, it's Brian.
And, oh yeah, he's studying para medicine, he's going to be a
paramedic, and so he can help us.
You know, he can come in here and help us in this situation which they might
not have ever have called this preacher, but they'll call an EMT to come and
help them.
Rob: Now while distance education is helping fill the need for rural
paramedics, rural ambulance service remains in critical condition.
More than 45 services have closed their doors since the year 2000, and many
others are teetering on solvency.
It's an issue we've been following, and one we'll talk more about in the
coming weeks.