New satellite campus set to anchor revitalized Pacific Tower
More options for people to train for healthcare careers. More healthcare workers to serve the community. Better access to medical care for area residents. That’s the vision of a project to return the iconic Pacific Tower building, perched atop Beacon Hill, to its original mission of public health. Seattle Central College will play an integral role in this effort with a new satellite campus focused on health education that’s slated to open in winter quarter.
“This is going to be a game-changer for our community,” said Seattle Central President Paul T. Killpatrick, Ph.D. “By moving our health education programs to the Pacific Tower in a state-of-the-art facility, we’ll be able to provide better training to more students for healthcare professions that are in need of skilled workers. This will benefit Seattle and the entire Puget Sound region for many years to come.”
The Seattle Central Health Education Center, as the new campus will be called, will comprise 85,000 square feet of classrooms, labs, offices, a library and other facilities over five floors of the tower. With the design phase finished, the focus now turns to construction, with the center set to open its doors in January 2016.
Programs to be housed in the new campus include nursing, respiratory care, surgical technology, dental hygiene and dental assisting (a program at Seattle Vocational Institute, part of Seattle Central). Additionally, a new Bachelor of Science in Nursing degree and two new tracks of an existing bachelor’s degree in Allied Health will be available at the new campus. Together, these programs will serve some of the 1,800 students enrolled in health programs across the Seattle Colleges District who would like to continue their education, in addition to area residents.
To prepare for the move into this new space, Seattle Central has created a healthcare advisory task force to bring together leaders of healthcare providers in the region – including Swedish, UW Medicine/Harborview Medical Center, Seattle Children’s, Virginia Mason Medical Center, NeighborCare and more than 20 others – to examine the needs of the sector in the next 10 to 15 years. This will help Seattle Central create the new campus and tailor its programs accordingly.
The building has a long history. Although it’s known for serving as the former headquarters of Amazon, it was originally built as a U.S. Marine Hospital to care for veterans and functioned as a healthcare facility in some form for most of its existence. Two years after Amazon left, State House Speaker Frank Chopp championed an effort to repurpose the building as a center for healthcare training and education. Funds were appropriated during the 2013 legislative session to achieve this goal.
In addition to Seattle Central’s new campus, the vision for the Pacific Tower includes a variety of health-focused nonprofit organizations under one roof. Cross Cultural Health Care has begun training medical interpreters, and FareStart, a culinary job training and placement program for homeless men and women, is planning a cafeteria and coffee shop, along with a production and catering kitchen.
Neighborcare Health, the largest operator of community health centers in Seattle, will work closely with Seattle Central to operate a new dental education clinic. One of the most innovative aspects of the project, this clinic is expected to provide over 18,000 patient visits annually for low-income individuals while giving Seattle Central’s Dental Hygiene students valuable on-the-job experience.