Getting to Know North Shore Health
Building a Career Close to Home: The Quiet Power of Education
By Meghan Flynn, NSH Education Coordinator, and edits by Danielle Hefferan, NSH Public Information Coordinator and Karla Pankow, NSH EMS Director
Humbling. Enlightening. An honor.
Those are the words North Shore Health (NSH) employees chose when asked to sum up their experience in healthcare so far.
For rural communities, growing the next generation of healthcare professionals requires more than recruiting talent - it means creating opportunities for people to learn, train, and build careers close to home. Through its education programs, NSH is helping students and aspiring healthcare professionals gain hands-on experience, develop valuable skills, and discover meaningful careers while strengthening the local workforce and building community resilience.
Ben Obinger and Ashley Schiffman are two Cook County residents whose paths into healthcare began through NSH’s education programs. While their journeys have taken different directions, both found mentorship, experience, and inspiration that continue to shape their futures.
Ben grew up in Cook County and is finishing his senior year at the University of Minnesota Duluth while preparing for medical school with hopes of one day practicing rural family medicine. Ashley moved to Grand Marais from the St. Louis Missouri area, drawn by the winters and the wilderness. What began as an interest in medicine, led her to North Shore Health’s Emergency Medical Technician (EMT) program and an interest to pursue Paramedic education.
A Front-Row Seat
In 2024, Ben went through the Summer Healthcare Internship Program (SHCIP), a program of the Minnesota Department of Health, sponsored by the Education Department at North Shore Health, designed to introduce students to careers in healthcare. Interns shadow in nearly every department of the hospital, from the ER to maintenance, with help from many staff members imparting wisdom along the way.
One slow day in the Emergency Department, Ben was shadowing a Physician, when a stroke patient came in. Ben followed the case all the way through witnessing the patient’s arrival with EMS, the physician’s treatment decisions, the CT scan with radiology staff, the nursing staff spring into action and the flight out for higher-level care. "I remember as soon as I got in the car, I called my Mom. [I told her] that was so awesome, this is 100 percent what I want to do.” That single afternoon didn't just confirm his interest in medicine, it gave him a research question. He's now studying rural stroke outcomes, interviewing stroke patients about their experiences and the barriers they face getting care in a rural area.
SHCIP provides students with a firsthand look at healthcare. It shows them how the pieces connect, and sometimes it confirms a calling because they witnessed an impactful moment in a patient’s life. “That first day of the internship, I was like, can I handle how stressful it can be in healthcare? Can I handle seeing people sick? My first day, I saw lots of sick people at the hospital and we went over to the care center and that was my first time seeing someone with dementia too. The internship inspired me to continue to get direct patient care.” By the end of the internship, Ben said he had gained the confidence to interact with the patients and be part of their care team. Ben went on to pursue his Certified Nursing Assistant (CNA) and Emergency Medical Responder (EMR) education in Duluth while in college. He is back for the second summer working as a CNA in North Shore Living Care Center.
Learning by Doing
Ashley's journey into healthcare began with the EMT program. While working at a resort up the Gunflint Trail, conversations with her boss at the resort led to meeting Jim Morrison with the Gunflint Trail Volunteer Fire Department, who pointed her to apply to the EMT program at NSH. Ashley enrolled in North Shore Health’s EMT program, where she was taught by EMS Director Karla Pankow.
Ashley doesn't hesitate when describing her experience in the EMT cohort: "Karla, as an instructor, was incredible... very hands-on. I felt like the training that we got was really thorough." The small class size meant real attention, real practice, and real support from the entire EMS crew she'd soon be working alongside in the ambulance department.
Ashley went from EMT trainee to full-time EMT. Since passing the National Registry of Emergency Medical Technicians (NREMT) exam and joining the ambulance department, Ashley has since taken on the role of EMS Captain in Hovland. Recently, she has also become a Basic Life Support (BLS) Instructor, sponsored by the NSH Education Department in response to meeting the CPR instructor needs of Cook County.
Although their paths into healthcare are different, both Ben and Ashley found the same thing at North Shore Health: mentors who invested in them, opportunities to learn by doing, and a clearer vision for where they wanted their careers to lead.
What It Gives Back
Both Ben and Ashley describe their growth in strikingly similar terms. Ben calls it humbling- recognizing, day by day, that he could handle what he once feared he couldn't. Ashley calls it enlightening- a front-row seat to the real needs of rural healthcare, and a small-team culture where, in her words, "we are truly all in this together."
For Ben, it's also personal: the chance to give back to the neighbors who raised him. For Ashley, it's discovering that a community she chose can become a career she didn't expect.
Ben and Ashley’s stories demonstrate that education is about more than career preparation. When healthcare training is available close to home, it allows community members to pursue rewarding careers without leaving the communities they love- and help ensure those communities have skilled caregivers for generations to come. That's the lasting impact of education programs and the heart of North Shore Health's mission: Community Access to Compassionate Care.
Upcoming Courses
EMR Refresher Course: Saturday and Sunday, October 17-18from 8:00 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. in the multi-purpose room. Enrollment is limited to 10 students. If interested, email Karla (karla.pankow@northshorehealthgm.org) by the registration deadline of September 30th.
NSH’s CNA Education Program is accepting applications until August 24th for the upcoming September 1 to November 20, 2026 cohort. This in-person, skills-based training ends with something concrete: a certification and a job waiting on the other side of it. Learn more and apply here: https://www.northshorehealthgm.org/community-education.
Other courses offered at NSH:
- American Heart Association BLS Initial and Refresher
- American Heart Association First Aid
- EMR-Initial, Refresher and EMT
For more information, visit: https://www.northshorehealthgm.org. Stay tuned for future informative “Getting to Know North Shore Health” articles, published monthly in the Cook County News Herald.
(Photo: Ben Obinger left and Ashley Schiffman teaching a Basic Life Support class right)