Feb 10, 2000

The meeting was called to order at 1830 hours by Chair Greg Thweatt. 18 people were in attendance representing 14 out of 22 services and 4 district positions. Those in attendance were:

• Ray introduced Rebecca Webb as the new Training Officer for Charlotte Rescue.

Review Agenda: The chair briefly reviewed the agenda for the meeting.

Motion to accept minutes of Jan 13, 2000 meeting by Ray, second by Ted. Motion passed.

• Next meeting will be held on March 9^th, 2000 at 1830 hours at St. Michael’s College.
• Jake reports that UVM is scheduling training with DART for late March, more details will be coming.
• Ted reports that Richmond is planning a cardiac training session with a cardiac physician for the first Thursday in March at 7 p.m. at the rescue station.
• EMT-B: Pat reports that five students missed the retest for their initial exam. Pat has made arraignments with Charlene Phelps for them to test in Middlebury on Tuesday the 22^nd. The State office needs a call for registration purposes.
• Steve asked about the possibility of a Summer EMT course: Pat replied that some interest has been expressed. He has spoken with some of the instructors and they are considering a weekend course (Fri. p.m., Sat day & Sun day – every other weekend). Course would run mid-May through mid-July; approx. 18 students would be needed to hold the course. Course format is still being discussed – contact Pat with suggestions or to express interest in attending.

• Policy on course requirements for District approved certification or refresher courses: (Greg) A new draft was distributed, a copy is also on the web page. Greg asked those in attendance to read the opening paragraphs as these have been changed in an attempt to clarify the policy. Discussion then continued by reviewing each numbered section.

1. Howie asked how course attendance limits are set and if a service had so many people interested in attending a course that they would max-out the attendance, how would the course remain open to the district? There was a good deal of discussion about this. Some saw the problem most likely to occur with the new first responder courses or a future transition course. Discussion resolved when group decided 10% of spaces would be reserved until one month from start of class for people outside of the service. Outside of service also includes people outside of the district.
2. Pat questioned the use of "course coordinator". Greg clarified that this terminology was used to allow the policy to apply to first responder courses as well as EMT courses.
3. This section still allows for use of practical instructors (PIs) from outside of the district. Tara asked how we would handle PIs who are active on more than one service when trying to fulfill the 50% split, would we be limiting resources? Greg does not want to make case-by-case exceptions. If a PI belongs to services X & Y and service X is holding a course, the PI cannot say they are representing service Y for convenience sake. Pat noticed that the geographic limit of courses was removed from the previous draft. Greg clarified that we can only approve district #3 courses. The previous problem with an approved course being held out-of-State was an exemption granted by the State office. Peter thought we should add something about covering the illness of a PI that would disrupt the 50% ratio. Greg & Tara agreed that planning is the key to maintaining this ratio. The PI "list" is only a tool; selection of PIs is not limited to this list. Ted suggested we review the policy in a year to see how it is functioning.
4. Change "no less than" to "a minimum of"
5. Tara suggested a district rep go to the service to administer the course evaluation. Timeliness of the evaluation is important.

• First Responder Instruction Role-Out report from Jan 15^th meeting: (Bill) Course curriculum is available on the State’s web page. Instructor needs to be an EMT-B and needs orientation training from one of the three who attended the Jan 15^th meeting. The orientation is relatively brief. Big question is how to we put this course on-line. There are big differences between current ECA and these new first responders. They will actually all be called ECAs. There will be old curriculum ECAs, new curriculum ECAs, and new curriculum ECAs who have entered into the module training path. Each ECA brings different skills and knowledge into the game. Those who enter the module track have three years to complete all modules and successfully transition to EMT-B. If transition does not occur, the ECA must retake the first responder course and begin again. A pre-conference workshop will be held on this topic. Time was running short and the committee was asked to come up with questions for next meeting, questions to be directed to Bill, Tara or Lee.

• Instructor Course: At the district board meeting in January the decision was to not entertain any request for admittance. The rural initiative has sponsored one individual. What attributes should we look for with future course submittals?
• Training Equipment: Last meeting Ray Walker raised the question of when we might replace broken district training equipment. Pat has begun by purchasing the first of two airway manikins and is looking into additional equipment purchases.

• Intubation Program: Question as to the program’s status was raised by Jeff. Tara reports that an intubation course should be scheduled but recertification date cannot be obtained and therefore no new courses are planned at this time.

Meeting adjourned at 1930 hours.

Respectfully submitted,

Jim Laskarzewski, clerk

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Last updated: February 14, 2000