Bristol: plans for King College med school moving ahead

[rccrain]

Right Jakila. Without a degree, you have to have a trade or marketable skill to survive. But too often I see the handyman working for business Bob. And while handyman jobs are semi-plentiful, blue collar manufacturing jobs are drying up everywhere.

If you look at the top paying jobs into the foreseeable future, the majority require a two year degree at a minimum. Further, realize that it's not always the education but also the alumni network, your peer network, and job hunting resources that are available from your college.

Here are the 50 Best Jobs in America. Best Jobs in America 2009 - Top 50 - Money Magazine on CNNMoney.com How many can you get without a degree?

Also note that #2 and #4 are Physicians Assistant and Nurse Practitioner, respectively. The people at King are not idiots, and the King Medical School will fill a need across the nation. I also don't get the rub with the folks at Quillen, at all.

[rccrain]

Another point not to be missed is that interest rates are at all time lows and building costs are down due to a more competitive building environment. This is the perfect time for expansion ... if you have the balance sheet to do it.

[mbmouse]

I believe King's medical program will be at the new Higher Ed center in downtown Kingsport, so the facility was already built for them.

[DiderotsGhost]

Originally Posted by rccrain

Right Jakila. Without a degree, you have to have a trade or marketable skill to survive. But too often I see the handyman working for business Bob. And while handyman jobs are semi-plentiful, blue collar manufacturing jobs are drying up everywhere.

Manufacturing jobs will probably grow over the next decade. No one's expecting it, but as the US Dollar weakens, American manufacturing will grow. It makes our exports more attractive in Europe and Asia with a weak Dollar. East Tennessee will actually benefit more than many other regions because of the lower wages/lower cost-of-living.

Not saying to bank on it; just that the common perception that American manufacturing will continue to erode is probably inaccurate; at least for the short-run.

If you look at the top paying jobs into the foreseeable future, the majority require a two year degree at a minimum.

The "top paying" jobs (aside from business owner) have always required a higher-level degree. This is nothing new. My point is that you don't have to have a college degree to earn a good living. In fact, some people are actually financially harmed by attending college in the dim hope that a college degree would give them access to quality jobs.

Some people are better off working technical jobs, working in agriculture, working at a factory, or working as a plumber.

Further, realize that it's not always the education but also the alumni network, your peer network, and job hunting resources that are available from your college.

Here are the 50 Best Jobs in America. Best Jobs in America 2009 - Top 50 - Money Magazine on CNNMoney.com How many can you get without a degree?

That's true to a degree, but the "network" you'll get at your garden variety school isn't that great to be honest. If you are getting an MBA at Penn --- then yes, your school's name will help you with networking. If you get a degree at Northeast State - not so much. Honestly, I can't think of any instance where having a degree from ETSU helped me networking --- even if it is a respected university.

My basic point here is that unless you have a specific career goal or you are a high academic achiever, college might not be beneficial. In fact, it could simply be a financial drain that distracts one from developing a marketable skill.

[rccrain]

Originally Posted by mbmouse

I believe King's medical program will be at the new Higher Ed center in downtown Kingsport, so the facility was already built for them.

They will have some classes available at the Kpt facility but this is different, an except:

Thursday’s $25 million vote of confidence by the Virginia Tobacco Indemnification and Community Revitalization Commission breathed life into the project. The money is earmarked for construction of the primary campus on an undetermined Virginia site “in close proximity” to Bristol Regional Medical Center, which is on the Tennessee side of town.

[NorthernLights]

There are points on both side of the issue. Yes, college has been made into the high school degree of the past [by colleges crankin out so many people with bachelors degrees], but if you don't have one it does not mean you will be stuck working at Wally World as rc stated and that may not necessarily be a bad thing. [I know someone in the Bristol area who has made his career at Wally World over the last two decades and worked his way to upper level management to a salary level that some doctors might envy.] Most people I know have degrees, all kinds of degrees [degrees that are/or at the time they got them, were considered valuable degrees to get [not underwater tiddly-winks or the history of television or one I saw the other day "Hip-Hop"] that are still paying off or only recently paid off and will tell you college has made no difference in their lives or made a negative impact in their lives from the debt, in spite of making serious efforts on their part to utilize those degrees. Sure some of the highest paid jobs in the nation require graduate level education to get but those are often very competitive jobs to land so for every person who is doing one of those 100+K a year jobs how many more people pursued all the education to qualify but were unable to find a opening? You read about the ones who made it big, you don't read about the ones who are tending bar somewhere applying for any opening anywhere in the US hoping someday they might get an interview.
I have a bachelor's and a graduate degree and in the interviews for jobs over the last 20 years, [some I landed, some I did not] the majority of employers/interviewers never asked me what I studied, what grade point average I had or to even prove that I had gotten the degrees listed on my resume. I produced copies of my transcripts and photocopies of my diplomas at many interviews of my own volition and they barely glanced at them. They were much more concerned with the type of projects I had worked on and the experience I had. There are other people who can say that they would never be where they are today without the degree they earned. It varies so much that it can be argued either way. I know one person who was about a year short of his degree and he's lied about having completed it for decades and no one cared. I have another friend who has a specialty engineering company, does quite well and has many employees operating computer controlled machining equipment and he sells a lot of his machinery to companies down here who make bedding and other types of assembly line manufacturing that requires specialized machinery to perform a complicated task in their assembly lines or in their warehouses. Dave never set foot in a college classroom nor has almost his entire staff. He got a job working on an assembly line and repairing it in the 80's and taught himself everything.
My girlfriend has a two year degree and is an RN. My best friend's wife has the same background. If they learn some specialty nursing skills they can pick up through their employers and/or work overtime and "on-call" a bit each year they'll make larger salaries than lots of people I know with four year or even grad degrees have ever or likely will ever be able to earn. I just saw this week and article that stated you can be an air traffic controller without a college degree, I didn't read the entire article but I know ATCs who got their experience in the military and I'm not sure whether they had degrees when they got out and started working but they're making a very livable wage. Sales is another area many of my friends w/out degrees have made great money working in as well.
My main concern is the obscene cost of college any more and they way admissions counselors and high school guidance counselors play that down. They quote dubious nationwide average salary statistics and point out to the kids and their parents that they'll be able to pay back that school debt no problem at "these salaries." I paid less for my Masters degree from U of MD and not decades ago either than many kids now will have to pay for a year's tuition/books and other costs at the undergrad level. They are being talked into taking debt that will put them into a monthly mortgage sized school loan payment when they get out of school which with most entry level salaries in many cities with high living costs will force them to stay local so they can live at home to pay the school loans and depending what they went to school for there may never be anything they can do in their major locally so...there they are, buried in debt and quite possibly worse off than if they'd pursued a two year degree to get into a medical field, go into the military, or took vocational training to do HVAC or some other trade skill. Years ago at my 20th high school reunion many of the folks who learned a trade and started their own masonry company, electrical company, hair salon, had made enough to pay off their home[s] and a lot of them were talking of selling their companies and retiring. None of them ever took any college courses. They learned about business on their own. They decided not to work for someone else and took the risk and the majority did quite well in business, they just hired accountants like most anyone else with their own businesses have to. Many of us with college degrees were still struggling to work our way up the corporate ladders, pay off our school debt and had just taken on 20-30 year mortgages. Skipping college for a good, "get your hands dirty" skill had given them the same success rate, maybe better.

[rccrain]

More details: Proposed King College school of medicine would be built in Washington County, Va. | TriCities (http://www2.tricities.com/tri/news/local/article/proposed_king_college_school_of_medicine_would_be_ built_in_washington_count/35289/ - broken link)

“The King School of Medicine will be built in Washington County, Va., and will include an affiliated research center,” Jordan told Abingdon Kiwanis Club members Tuesday. It was his most specific indication yet where the planned $50 million medical and health science center might be established.

In the past, Jordan has said only that a Bristol-area facility would be built “in close proximity” to the Bristol Regional Medical Center, which could include both Bristols, Sullivan County, Tenn., and Washington County, Va.

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Reynolds said he doesn’t know a specific location, but believes it would be built somewhere between Interstate 81’s Exit 1 in Virginia and Exit 74 in Tennessee. The hospital is just inside the Tennessee line, at Exit 74.

On Wednesday, Jordan reassured about 75 members of the Kingsport Rotary Club that the Virginia facility won’t alter plans to establish an affiliated campus there. After that speech, he also zeroed in on a likely location.

“It will be built in close proximity to Holston Valley Hospital and Holston Medical Group facilities,” Jordan said. “Investments made in Tennessee will stay in Tennessee and investments made in Virginia will be built in Virginia.”

HMG, a regional physicians group, has offices on Stone Drive, less than half a mile from the Holston Valley campus. The doctor’s organization and Wellmont Health System, which operates both tertiary care hospitals, are clinical partners in the King plan.

The proposed Kingsport center would accommodate third- and fourth-year medical students involved in clinical training as well as research opportunities for students, medical residents and physicians.