By Jack Clark

UNBC

Inspired Career Summer Institute wraps up at UNBC

Jun 24, 2022 | 4:35 PM

PRINCE GEORGE- More than two dozen trainees from across Canada are in Prince George for The Age-Well Early Professionals Inspired Career Summer Institute at UNBC this week.

A week-long project that wrapped up today, with the efforts to try and tackle some of the north’s biggest problems.

“We bring them into an area where we give them a challenge. And in this case, we’ve actually got four challenges associated with some problem areas that were provided to us by Northern Health,” said Dr. Josephine McMurray, the Associate Scientific Director for Age Well.

This week’s primary focus was the care of seniors in the north, with four main points discussed. Aging at home, Staying connected, issues around long-term care and issues around health service delivery. On top of that, one more challenge the students faced was not knowing their groups until Monday.

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“We run them through some team-building exercises, but it’s up to them to develop those close relationships and relationships of trust as we through the week,” said Dr. McMurray. “We teach them how to think about business models and develop solutions. So that’s what they’ve been working on. And now we’re getting them at the end of this week to actually pitch those solutions.”

The pitches produced different ideas, including apps that can help integrate more technology into long-term care facilities.

“I think this issue has been here for years, and I think it’s been growing,” said Dr. Shannon Freeman, the Academic Director for CTAAN. “When we think about aging and technology, we know that 75% of older adults are confident using technology, and many of them see great value in using that to help support their health and health care decisions.”

While the week wrapped up with Dragons Den-style pitches, it was full of different seminars, workshops and engagement sessions.