Not yet a year old, the Alliance for Healthcare Education is expected to take a significant step forward in the coming year with $15 million in state funding.

The amount was part of the final budget signed Friday by Gov. Mike Parson.

The alliance is a partnership between CoxHealth, Missouri State University, Ozarks Technical Community College and Springfield Public Schools to revolutionize the way health care professionals are training in southwest Missouri. The goal is to fill critical workforce shortages.

“To meet that need, we simply had to think differently,” said Shallina Goodnight, executive director of the alliance, in a release. “We needed to find ways to join forces and create paths to not only educate the next generation, but also to positively transform the health and prosperity of our region for generations to come.”

Each partner has allocated resources to the unprecedented effort but the state funding is the first major investment, which was needed to propel the work forward.

“It’s hard to even quantify. Without the funding, we would just be looking at what we could do — which would be very small, incremental changes — over a long period of time,” Goodnight said in a Monday interview.

“At the moment, we have a lot of opportunity for growth.”

The alliance will eventually take over space within the Cox College footprint inside of the Cox North campus. The funding will be used to renovate nearly 30,000 square feet of additional hospital space for the alliance.

It will build upon existing health care training programs at MSU and OTC and provide space for more high school students to explore health care careers and start taking courses toward certifications and degrees.

“The renovations will allow us to more quickly expand, even double, those programs but also give us space to invite high school students onto our campus as well,” Goodnight said. “Without the funding, we would have had to kind of tiptoe and sit a few people here, a few people there, over a period of many years.”

Springfield Public Schools students will have access to certificate and associate degree programs at no cost, while health care employees can pursue education subsidized by their employers.

An initial cohort of Springfield high school students will enter the alliance pipeline this fall, initially studying on the OTC campus. There will be 32 students enrolled.

“High school students will receive industry-specific training and earn career certifications alongside their diplomas, giving them a head start in their careers,” Goodnight said in the release. “At the same time, adults have the opportunity to skill up and reach their full professional potential — all within a seamlessly integrated system.”

The alliance is preparing for a full program launch in fall 2025.

‘Building the foundation’

Formed in August 2023, the alliance is working on its infrastructure during its second year. That includes renovating the campus but also mapping out programs, figuring out communication plans, and creating a website.

“There are so many exciting big initiatives that we are really looking forward to working on but first we’ve got to make sure that we’re building the foundation so that it is effectively able to scale as the growth happens,” she said.

The private Cox College currently occupies 70,000 square feet of classrooms, offices, and laboratories — filled with health care technology and equipment — in the northeast part of Cox North.

The college will eventually be absorbed into the alliance and cease to confer degrees in its name. However, in the next few years, the college and alliance will co-exist on campus as existing Cox College students finish programs and degrees.

Goodnight said the additional space renovated as part of the alliance will have the “same look and feel” as the space used by Cox College, which was recently updated.

She said a meeting with stakeholders on July 15 will help with the planning.

“This is just Phase I of our expansion. We’re going to need multiple expansions,” Goodnight said. “CoxHealth has been generous enough to gift the alliance all the square footage we could possibly need in a hospital setting.”

She added: “Our dollars can go so much further in a clinical setting versus trying to do something like a new build.”

More: Here’s how 4 southwest Missouri institutions plan to revolutionize health care training

Following the July meeting with stakeholders and a board meeting July 18, the alliance will be closer to scheduling the groundbreaking for any renovations, she said.

Asked if the alliance planned to add new partners — beyond the four that founded the alliance — Goodnight said there are conversations happening.

“We absolutely want not just other educational entities, both higher ed and other K-12 school districts, we also want to support all of the healthcare providers in our community and those that touch it as well,” she said. “So we should have some exciting news to announce later this month.”

This article originally appeared on Springfield News-Leader: Missouri health care education alliance gets $15M in state funding