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Baxter Health has put 192 area high school students through its White Coat program since 2021, and 42 of them now work at the hospital.
The program introduces students to health care careers through classroom work, job shadowing and time alongside hospital staff. Baxter Health’s workforce development and clinical education teams write the curriculum, teach the classes and arrange the hospital placements.
The hires break down across the building. Baxter Health counts 13 patient care technicians, 12 nurses, eight laboratory technicians, two paramedics and seven people in other health care and support roles.
Another 67 former participants went on to college. Of those, 53 are studying something health care related.
The numbers work out to roughly 38 students a year over five years, with about one in five eventually hired by the hospital.
That matters in a region where filling clinical jobs is a persistent problem. Rural hospitals across Arkansas compete for the same nurses and technicians, often against larger systems in Springfield, Little Rock and northwest Arkansas that can pay more.
A pipeline built out of local high schools is an attempt to solve that closer to home, by reaching students before they leave the area rather than trying to recruit them back later.
Baxter Health credited high school teachers and counselors for the partnership, saying their work is what connects the hospital to students in the first place.
The hospital described the effort as investing early and building a pipeline that serves students, the hospital and the surrounding communities.
