Did you know James Cook University had a campus in Cloncurry?
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JCU’s Judith March said she was one of three lecturers teaching nursing students based in the ‘Curry at the university campus in the health precinct on King Street, which was the old Cloncurry Shire Council building.
Ms March and the other lecturers were joined by students at the Post Office Hotel last Friday for drinks to celebrate the end of O Week, the orientation week that marks the start of the university calendar.
Ms March said JCU started in Cloncurry six years ago offering courses in nursing.
“We started because people wanted to do nursing locally,” Ms March said.
“And we wanted to train home-grown nurses as well.”
Ms March said the building was equipped with a small library, meeting and lecture rooms, and importantly, video facilities so they could connect with lectures and lecturers remotely as well as help the local hospital.
“Administratively, we are under the Mount Isa Centre for Rural and Remote Health (MICRRH), and we work closely with the local Cloncurry Hospital, two of us work there full time, the other part time,” she said.
“We have a full simulation lab down there, any of the nurses at Cloncurry Hospital can come down there and use it as well.”
Ms March said they had nine students on campus at the moment at different stages of the three year course.
“We’ve got five post-graduate nurses, doing education and tropical health, which is quite good,” she said.
“We also support enrolled nurses doing TAFE (courses).”
Ms March said one of the benefits of having a local campus was the ability to support working parents.
“A lot of the students have children, one has five children, another has four,” she said.
“What they’ll do then is go over to Townsville (JCU campus) and do a two week block.”
MICRRH offers the nationally accredited James Cook University Bachelor of Nursing Science program in Mount Isa and Cloncurry with the specific intention of growing a remote and rural-focussed nursing workforce.