NUCOR And FRHS Team Up To Teach EV Students CPR

If you are ever at Subs and Suds in Tilden and suddenly see the need for CPR, look for your nearest Elkhorn Valley student.

More specifically, a seventh grader or a senior. That’s because they spent the day Monday learning the basics of CPR thanks to a partnership from Nucor and Faith Regional Health Services in Norfolk. The two companies have teamed up to provide CPR training kits to various schools across the area, including Elkhorn Valley.

“Faith Regional and Nucor worked together in a fundraiser,” explained Jenny Simmons, chest pain and stroke coordinator at Faith Regional. “We combined forces and wanted to get involved in the community initiative. So we decided to get involved with the schools and used the money to purchase, from the Heart Association, these hands on CPR kits.”

Simmons, along with two nurse practitioners, used the kits to help teach students the basics of CPR in a 40 minute course. The class begins with an instructional video and the students spend their time working with the mannequins provided in the kit, practicing compressions.

Learning CPR is nothing new for Elkhorn Valley students, as all freshman are required to go through a CPR course during their first year of high school. However, Nebraska is one of 16 schools across the country that does not make CPR training mandatory for high school graduation. Simmons sees that changing soon.

“I do think Nebraska will see a bill to try to mandate that high schools make it mandatory to provide CPR certification for their graduating seniors,” she said. “The more community awareness that people have and the importance of why you’d want this will hopefully make that bill successful.”