Public Health Careers
Public Health Pre-Apprenticeship Program (CO-HELPS Grant Program)
Taking the Next Step Towards a Career as a Health Professional
The full pre-apprenticeship program includes training for positions in containment of the COVID-19 virus, career exploration of health professions and overall career counseling to help students move into occupations within the healthcare industry. Completion of the full pre-apprenticeship program could result in free college credit.
Pre-apprentices will receive the career exploration and career counseling while training to be one of three occupations that are key to the containment of COVID-19. Those 3 occupations are: Case Investigators, Contract Tracers, and Resource Coordinators.
- Case Investigators reach out to individuals testing positive for COVID-19 with information about quarantine and to gather information about other individuals who may have been exposed.
- Contact Tracers communicate with those individuals likely exposed to let them know what precautions they should take to avoid unintentional spread of the virus.
- Resource Coordinators work with individuals who may need support connecting with services and resources if they are infected with the virus or asked to quarantine because of exposure to a positive case.
While some of these roles will be ongoing, most will have shorter timeframes to cover the period of containment for COVID-19 making it important to provide opportunities in other health professions.
This pre-apprenticeship program is a partnership with the Rocky Mountain Public Health Training Center (RMPHTC), The Public Health Workforce Collaborative, the Colorado Community College System (CCCS), Arapahoe Community College (ACC) and Community College of Denver (CCD).
The community colleges will offer online career exploration modules for students to review while doing their COVID training and provide career counseling and navigation to students in the following 13 key health career pathways:
- Nursing Pathways
- Nursing
- Practical Nursing
- Nurse Aide
- Occupational and Physical Therapy Pathways
- Occupational Therapy Assistant
- Physical Therapy Assistant
- Medical Records Pathways
- Health Information Technology
- Health Informatics
- Billing and Coding
- Behavior Health Pathway
- Psychiatric Technician
- Respiratory Therapist Pathway
- Medical Assistant Pathway
- Medical Lab Science Pathways
- Phlebotomy
- Medical Lab Technology
- Dental Pathways
- Dental Hygiene
- Dental Assisting
- Surgical Technology Pathway
- Radiologic Technology Pathway
- EMT/Paramedicine Pathway
- Sterile Processing Pathway
- Nutrition Pathways
- Certified Dietary Manager
- Dietetic Technician
Completion of the trainings in one of the occupations that are key to the containment of COVID-19, completion of the 13 career modules, completion of a BLS course, and meeting with a workforce navigator from one of the community colleges will result in three free credits at Community College of Denver. In addition, more academic credit may be available for your time training and working in one of the three occupations needed to contain COVID-19. All training and courses are free to individuals.
Register for the Self-Paced Colorado Public Health Workforce Collaborative Training and Career Pathways*
Onboarding and Training Resources
* This will register you for the full self-paced modules including Contact Tracing, Case Investigation, Resource Coordination, and Dr. Justina Tracing Software System as well as Career Pathways.
For more information regarding the Public Health Pre-Apprenticeship Program please contact
Colorado Public Health Workforce Collaborative
