ANN ARBOR—
ANN ARBOR—Ypsilanti high school and middle school students are spending Saturday mornings this spring exploring careers in health care during a series of workshops organized by the Health Occupations Partners in Education (HOPE) Program.
“Our Saturday morning workshops feature presentations, activities and tours by nurses, sports trainers, paramedics, physicians, dentists, pharmacists, research scientists and public health directors,” said Linda Cunningham, HOPE’s program director. “We try to provide information and help students stay focused on what they need to do now to prepare for a future career as a health care professional or technician. But we want the workshops to be fun, too, so we emphasize hands-on, interactive activities.”
HOPE was created in the fall of 1998 when seven University of Michigan schools and colleges, the U-M Hospitals and Health Centers, community groups and private industry merged forces with educators and administrators in the Ypsilanti Public Schools. Their common goal is to increase the number of under-represented minority students who pursue a career in all areas of health care. While the program is geared to minority students, all middle and high school students in the Ypsilanti Public School District are free to participate.
The Michigan program is part of nationwide initiative instituted by the American Association of Medical Colleges to address the growing problem of too few minority students entering the health professions.
“The number of Black, Latino and Native American students interested in health-related careers decreases every year from elementary school on,” said Lisa A. Tedesco, a U-M professor of dentistry and co-principal investigator for the HOPE program. “HOPE’s goal is to develop a successful model for how to recruit qualified minority students into the health professions and sustain their participation through the critical middle school and high school years.”
“HOPE opens additional doors of opportunity for many of our students who have not had access to careers in science or medicine in the past,” said David Zuhlke, superintendent of the Ypsilanti Public Schools. “It is an important partnership and supports our efforts to reduce the achievement gap between white and minority students.”
Although the program has only been under way for one semester, Cunningham says it already has strong support from Ypsilanti teachers, students and parents. By the fall of 1999, Cunningham plans to provide volunteer mentors and tutors to work with students individually.
HOPE partners include the Ypsilanti Public Schools; Washtenaw Community College; the Minister’s Alliance of Ann Arbor, Ypsilanti and Vicinity; Ypsilanti-Willow Run NAACP; Parke-Davis Warner Lambert; Washtenaw County Black Nurses Association; the Association of Multicultural Scientists; Washtenaw County Task Force on African American Health; and the U-M’s School of Dentistry, School of Education, Medical School, School of Nursing, College of Pharmacy, School of Public Health, School of Social Work, and U-M Hospitals and Health Centers.
“This is the first time all health-related U-M schools and colleges have joined together to support one project,” Cunningham said. “Our overriding goal is to help young people achieve their full potential.”
The HOPE Program is funded by the Association of American Medical Colleges, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the W.K. Kellogg Foundation through the Project 3000 by 2000 Health Professions Partnership initiative, with matching funding from the partner schools at the U-M and Parke-Davis.
For more information about the HOPE Program, contact the HOPE program office at (734) 647-5774.

Hospitals and Health CentersAmerican Association of Medical CollegesdentistryWashtenaw Community CollegeRobert Wood Johnson Foundation