CHANGING STUDENT HEALTH Prairie Star serves as HutchCC’s new healthcare center Brogen Willich

Changing Student Health

Why students need to know about Prairie Star and the resources they provide.

Brogen Willich, Reporter & Designer

Being away from home for the first time combined with being sick, especially in the middle of a pandemic, can cause students and parents additional stress.

Health services have changed at Hutchinson Community College and students should know where to go and how to get help if they get sick or injured.

Hutchinson Area Student Health Services (HASHS) is an organization that started about 30 years ago. It was started to provide free basic healthcare and check ups for college and high school students. The health center

▼ Photo by Brogen Willich ▼

Dana Hinshaw, Residence Life Director, leads a resident’s assistant meeting. Hinshaw played a big role in choosing the new student health center. that was once located north of the main campus parking lot has now been changed to Prairie Star due to cost.

Healthcare is a hot topic in today’s world with the Covid-19 pandemic. It has affected everyone’s lives over the past seven months, and is still affecting the students at HutchCC.

“I hope this will be better for our students because they have extended hours,” Dana Hinshaw, Residence Life Director, said about the student health center change.

Prairie Star is open from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Friday. The facility offers more services and more equipment, like pediatric, dental, behavioral health, occupational medicine, vision and optical, lab, x-rays, mammograms and money-saving pharmacy programs. Prairie Star’s mission is to provide healthcare to anyone and everyone in Hutchinson.

When it comes to the coronavirus, Hinshaw hopes we don’t get a lot of cases on campus because that could mean repercussions. She made it clear that they are trying to use the “carrot” approach rather than the “stick” approach to encourage students to wear masks and properly social distance.

Hinshaw said that other colleges are taking a more strict route by punishing students with fines but she hopes that HutchCC doesn’t get to that point.

“We don’t want everyone feeling like it’s a prison,” Hinshaw said.

She said students are good about wearing masks from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., but after 5 p.m. is a struggle for students in the dorms.

That’s why the residence life team always tells students to wear their masks. They know how hard it is to wear a mask at the dorms because that’s home to the students.

“Every night we check cameras in the dorms and public areas and pick four students, two get a free wash and dry, and two get free Bogey’s shake coupons,” said Hinshaw.

Antonio Cooper, Junction City, said, “I’ve seen a couple people not wearing a mask around but we’re doing pretty good.”

Cooper said students are doing a good job wearing their masks. If students continue to wear masks, classes may be able to stay on campus. While on the other hand, if student’s do not follow the rules, campus may be shut down again.

Being a student-athlete on the track team, Cooper said, “The coaches are strict, they send us messages and emails every single day, they do temp checks, and really just stay on us to wear our masks.”

These extra steps in communication and staying on top of it are why we can continue to stay in school. Prairie Star is provided so that students can stay ahead of their medical situations, especially relevant with Covid-19. They are here for students to get the medical attention they need. If students continue to wear masks in their halls and around campus and follow social distancing guidelines, classes have a chance of staying in-person.

◄ Photo by Brogen Willich ◄

Track athlete Antonio Cooper, Junction City, sports his mask while walking through the hallway of the dorms. Cooper is a freshman thrower who competes in shotput, discus, javelin, and hammer.

▼ Photo by Brogen Willich ▼

Serving as the new student health center, Prairie Star Health Center, is located at 2700 E. 30th Ave.

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Regan LaRue, Reporter & Designer KJ Ryan, Photographer

The lives of Americans changed forever when the twin towers fell on Sept. 11, 2001. America will never forget that day and neither will firefighters for generations to come.

On that day out of the 2,977 individuals that fell victim to the attack, 343 of them were firefighters. To pay respect to the firefighters who sadly lost their lives that day, the Hutchinson Community College Fire Science program commemorated the fallen firefighters with a ceremony. Four students layed a fireman’s uniform underneath the American flag at half mast.

The ceremony will continue to be a tradition within the program as they pay tribute to those who lost their lives doing their job.