Career Education Review

According to a recent report in the Chronicle of Higher Education, Pima Medical Institute ranks #1 among 4-year, for-profit institutions with a 78.3% on-time graduation rate. The on-time graduation rate is an important metric – meaning students are successfully completing their classes and sticking with their program.

This type of result doesn’t happen by accident. Pima Medical’s Director of Online Education, Deborah Ayers, has been on the education frontlines for more than two decades and attributes Pima Medical’s success to great course content, engaged faculty and amazing support personnel.

“I’m so very proud of all of the work and dedication that everyone on my team provides to help our online students reach their goal—on time,” Ayers said. “The fact that our students are 100% online is even more phenomenal. Our students are juggling job pressures, kids, aging parents, health challenges, etc. and we’re still getting them to the finish line.”

For more than 45 years, Pima Medical has been educating healthcare professionals and the online program takes the ability to educate students to a new level. The online programs offer students the flexibility to earn their degree while maintaining their professional and personal commitments.

Prior to coming to Pima Medical, Ayers had managed online programs at a previous school. According to Ayers, “That prior experience brought many lessons learned and best practices, and I was very fortunate that Pima Medical gave me the freedom to build out its online campus incorporating that knowledge as I went.”

Ayers says, “There is an unwritten “formula” that many schools use as a foundation for their online campuses, and much of it doesn’t promote good learning outcomes or student persistence. At Pima Medical Institute we want to make sure our students are set up for success.”

Pima Medical builds virtually all its course material in-house using its own design team – ensuring material is engaging and relevant to healthcare professionals. Pima does not outsource its online technical support and, as a result, students are provided with a high level of support.

“We also tell our faculty that it is our ambition to have the best online faculty in the education space,” said Ayers. “We look for faculty who truly have a passion to teach and mentor and I believe we have a great support structure for them as well.”

Pima Medical Institute offers a variety of associate and bachelor’s degree programs 100 percent online. For more information on those programs or to set up an appointment with a medical career specialist go to https://pmi.edu/online.