Magnifique! Bilingual nursing students experience the rural lifestyle in Lac La Biche County
Channel: RhPAP
Date: 2020-03-26

18 nursing students and one physiotherapy student from the University of Alberta Campus Saint-Jean  came to Lac La Biche County in early March to discover the lifestyle. These bilingual students had many opportunities to speak french with the locals. 

In the French community of Plamondon, they tasted 'la tire sur la neige' - maple syrup poured onto snow, allowed to cool and then rolled onto a stick. The winter celebration La Cabane á Sucre also . included musical performances and sleigh rides.

Also in Plamondon, the students toured Tree de la vie Midwifery. Midwife Chantal Gauthier-Vaillancourt told them in french that her and fellow midwife Marianne King perform 50 to 60 births a year, 90% of which are water births, with half done in the home and half in hospital.

A tour of the Lac La Biche Mission was also presented in french. This Roman Catholic Mission was established in 1853 and is a national historic site. 

The skills weekend was sponsored by Faculté Saint-Jean and RhPAP.  For the first time ever, students stayed in cabins. The cabins are located in Sir Winston Churchill Provincial Park next to Lac La Biche Lake. That’s also where the students were the guests of a community dinner.

In Lac La Biche, the students dined at the Fat Unicorn Brewery, watched the Junior B Lac La Biche Clippers play hockey at the Bold Centre and caught a glimpse of a large pond hockey tournament on Lac La Biche Lake.

The bilingual students toured the William J. Cadzow Lac La Biche Healthcare Centre. Across the street at Portage College, they participated in the skills portion of the weekend. Jana McKinley, an instructor with the Community Social Work Program at the college, gave a presentation on mental health. The students also had hands-on training in suturing, interosseous injections and advanced airway management.

By the end of the skills weekend, many of the students expressed an interest in practising in rural Alberta.