Alliance for Healthcare Education campus preps for influx of high school students

The Alliance for Healthcare Education plans to focus on recruitment and a renovation project in the coming months as it prepares to welcome Middle College students to campus in August.

In a Feb. 2 meeting, officials said interest among high school students has exceeded expectations.

Tina Pham-Morgan, director of operations, said it is too early to predict the final fall enrollment. The goal was to admit 100 high school students from the Springfield area, but there is room for more.

“We are absolutely aiming for strong enrollment this fall, and we’re ready for it. We will have capacity for up to 250 high school students, and we’ve designed the model so we can grow beyond that as interest climbs,” she said. “The big goal is simple: If a student is ready to step into a health care pathway, we want to be ready for them too and we don’t want space to be the reason anyone gets told ‘not yet.’”

The first-if-its-kind alliance launched in 2023 as a partnership between CoxHealth, Missouri State University, Ozarks Technical Community College and Springfield Public Schools to train health care workers and address critical workforce shortages in southwest Missouri.

By working together, the institutions vowed to reduce barriers and offer affordable options.

Currently, the alliance is serving more than 600 high school and college students in various partner programs and campuses.

Representatives from MSU and Ozarks Tech provided spring enrollment numbers and a preview of applications for upcoming cohorts.

“In some of these situations, we’re talking about demand two or three times the size of classes we have today,” said Max Buetow, president and CEO of CoxHealth.

Pham-Morgan said the alliance has applicants from “all five SPS high schools” plus Nixa, Republic and Logan-Rogersville for the next year. The alliance is exploring options in Bolivar, including the possibility of establishing a hub in Polk County.

The Middle College program, which allows students to complete high school and college courses at the same time, offers a general health science track and training to become a certified nursing assistant or emergency medical technician. It is located on the Ozarks Tech campus.

The health-related Middle College programs will move to the alliance headquarters at Cox North at the start of the 2026-27 year.

To create space for those students and others, the alliance embarked on a $15 million renovation to revamp about 50,000 square feet on multiple floors.

Once the Cox North renovation is complete, the alliance will have a total footprint of 130,000 square feet including a new dining hall, 13 new education spaces and lounges for study and collaboration.

Rob Rector, executive vice chancellor of administrative services at Ozarks Tech, said revamping the space has presented challenges, but progress is being monitored closely. He said the goal is to finish work by July 31.

“We do know, at the very least, we have the classrooms ready to go,” he said. “Some of the other parts of the project may end up waiting a little bit.”

In a follow-up interview, Rector said delays are not uncommon when moving walls and reconfiguring an older building.

“When you start your demo and you pull things out, the reality is sometimes different that the prior plans you had, so you make adjustments,” he said. 

The alliance includes education affiliate Evangel University and workforce affiliates Burrell Behavioral Health and Citizens Memorial Hospital.

Officials said the preliminary expenses for fiscal year 2027 are $1.98 million, but the operating budget is still a work in progress. That is a slight increase over spending in the current fiscal year.

Shallina Goodnight, executive director, said the alliance hopes to fill a gap created by closure of the Greater Ozarks Center for Advanced Professional Studies, or GO CAPS, program.

The Springfield-based program, which ends in May, offered hands-on exploration in different career paths, including medicine and health care, to high school juniors and seniors.

Goodnight said the alliance will explore a half-day option, like GO CAPS, that allows students to remain at their high school part-time to take other classes and participate in extracurricular activities.

“We definitely know there is interest in that,” she said. “We hear from high school students quite a bit that they would love to be part of it, but they really still want to be in band or whatever. They want to have a connection with their high school.”

[Editor’s note: Shallina Goodnight is an owner of Springfield Business Journal as of 2026. She is not involved in day-to-day company operations.]