When Justine Shaw signed up for Thompson Rivers University’s respiratory therapy program, she had no idea just how hands-on of an education she’d get.
Shaw is one of 65 students who were on track to finish the program this year who had their graduations fast-tracked as COVID-19 arrived in the province.
Respiratory therapists are specially trained to operate ventilator machines, the artificial systems that can keep life-saving oxygen flowing to the lungs of patients suffering severe respiratory illnesses.
With officials uncertain just how badly the coronavirus would hit B.C. hospitals, the decision was made to graduate students from TRU’s program — the only one of its kind in the province — several weeks early. “At first I was a little bit