With an ever-increasing scope of practice, Cambrian College is one of 17 colleges across the province transforming their two-year paramedic diplomas into three-year degrees.
The Sudbury college’s board of governors approved the new three-year degree at their Dec. 11 meeting, with an anticipated launch date of September 2026. All colleges offering paramedicine would launch the degree simultaneously.
Sudbury’s other college, Collège Boréal, also offers paramedicine training.
While the program’s addition still needs to be approved by the province, Cambrian’s vice-president, academic Janice Clarke explained that the new program is an initiative that comes from the Ontario Ministry of Health.
She explained that over the last decade that there’s “increasing competencies that have been downloaded onto what the Minister of Health wants a front-line paramedic to be able to do.”
Clarke gave the example of doing “IVs directly into bone marrow.”
“That's an example of a competency that it's not like we could take something out of the program and add that in,” she said.
She explained that as a two-year degree, paramedicine has become extremely dense in its workload.
With the typical program, students are in school 18 to 21 hours a week, but the paramedicine program was 28 to 31 hours a week, causing poor retention rates just because the workload was so intense.
“So in most cases, what we're doing is just taking the curriculum from the two years and spreading it out over the three years so that it's not as dense,” Clarke said.
With mental health concerns more common among paramedics, “they've taken the opportunity to add in a whole bunch of content around PTSD, resiliency, training, burnout, and looking at those factors and building that into curriculums,” she said.
These courses teach students how to cope with stress, become more resilient, and “when these experiences happen, why is it really critically important that you do a debrief right away.”
Clarke said all 17 colleges in Ontario have been engaged in the work of launching the new three-year paramedicine degree. The province gave the go-ahead to colleges to develop three-year degrees in 2022.
“One college (Humber College) was selected to actually draft all the curriculum,” she said. “That curriculum has been reviewed by the Ontario Chiefs of Paramedicine, Ministry of Health, lots of conversation back and forth, as you can imagine.
“And the idea would be that all colleges would transition in fall 2026, all 17 colleges at the same time. We can't really have some doing two years and some doing three years.”
Cambrian’s board also approved two other programs at the Dec. 11 meeting, one of which was a one-year graduate certificate in serious games development, and the other a two-year diploma in building-construction technician - carpentry.
The board package said “serious games are designed for purposes beyond entertainment. They use game engines to build engaging experiences, gamification to motivate learners, and XR technologies to build innovative solutions across various sectors of the workforce.
“In this one-year program, students will discover how video game design techniques and technologies are transforming the ways in which we learn, do business, and drive industry.
“Graduates will be prepared to work as part of a team in many industries including mining, construction, health, education, research, and more as serious game and game design specialists.”
The two-year diploma in building-construction technician - carpentry will see students “learn to use a variety of tools of the trade while following plans, specifications, and codes for the construction of residential and commercial buildings,” said the board package.
“Students will gain hands-on experience through work-integrated learning opportunities, preparing them to enter the workforce or pursue an apprenticeship. The curriculum covers all levels of theoretical apprenticeship training and includes a competitive co-op.”
Clarke said Cambrian already has a one-year carpentry program, and it’s adding a two-year option to give students additional training, allowing them “more opportunities for advancement in that field.”
Heidi Ulrichsen is Sudbury.com’s assistant editor. She also covers education and the arts scene.