Once On Life Support, PCC AHA Training Program Earns American Heart Association All-Star Award (Photo) - 08/12/26

PORTLAND, Ore. – It wasn't long ago that Portland Community College’s lifesaving CPR and emergency cardiovascular care program was on its last breaths and ready to close its doors. But thanks to dedicated staff, PCC’s American Heart Association (AHA) Training Center has come back to life by earning the American Heart Association’s 2025 All-Star Award. It is one of the first training centers nationwide to receive the honor, recognizing its success in delivering lifesaving education to healthcare professionals, students and community members.

The training center, housed within PCC’s Healthcare and Emergency Professions pathway, was part of the first group of centers to earn the new national recognition. The award honors American Heart Association training centers that consistently provide high-quality CPR and emergency cardiovascular care education, follow rigorous training standards and demonstrate exemplary program compliance.

“This award is a testament to the continued commitment to educational excellence and service demonstrated by our entire instructional team,” said Janeen Hull, dean of PCC’s Healthcare and Emergency Professions Pathway. “These courses ensure that learners are prepared to respond confidently in medical emergencies, directly strengthening overall community safety.”

PCC’s training center is a life-saver, literally and figuratively. It offers courses designed for healthcare providers, students entering medical professions and members of the public who want to develop emergency response skills. Faculty also offer customized training solutions for employers, healthcare facilities, schools, and other organizations. The center provides basic life support, advanced cardiovascular life support, pediatric advanced life support, advanced stroke life support and heartsaver courses that cover CPR, automated external defibrillator use and basic first aid.

"The classes provide foundational instruction, professional upskilling and continuing education for credit and non-credit students. They also help healthcare organizations maintain a qualified workforce by ensuring employees meet certification requirements," Hull said.

Nearly all healthcare providers must maintain basic life support certification, while many nurses, physicians, paramedics and other professionals are also required to hold advanced cardiovascular life support, pediatric advanced life support or advanced stroke life support credentials.

“The demand remains high because healthcare professionals must maintain current certifications as a condition of employment,” said Teresa Parrish, who supports PCC’s American Heart Association training center. “Without these certifications, they may be unable to perform their jobs or provide patient care.”

The American Heart Association evaluates training centers using several performance measures, including certification eCard activity, participant feedback, training quality and adherence to emergency cardiovascular care guidelines. Students and graduates are asked about their classroom experience, course length, required materials, instructor performance and whether they would recommend the course to others.

Many students enrolled in PCC’s healthcare programs must earn American Heart Association basic life support certification before participating in clinical education or entering the workforce. Providing that training directly through PCC makes it more accessible and allows students to complete academic and professional requirements through a trusted institution.

PCC’s recognition carries special meaning for Parrish because the college’s training center has operated for 24 years and has overcome obstacles.

In 2004, the center trained more than 18,000 students. Its enrollment later declined, and the program faced the possibility of closure shortly before the COVID-19 pandemic. PCC ultimately maintained the center, while community and healthcare partners, including Life Flight Network, Legacy Health, Just in Time Training and Medical Outreach CPR, helped sustain its work during the pandemic.

The center initially resumed instruction through online coursework before returning to in-person operations. Participation has continued to grow as PCC has rebuilt its training offerings and strengthened connections with internal healthcare programs and external partners.

“I am most proud that we are making a comeback; that we did not give up,” Parrish said. “Being recognized after everything the program has been through shows the dedication of our instructors, partners and students.”

About Portland Community College: Founded in 1961, Portland Community College is the largest post-secondary institution in Oregon and provides training, degree and certificate completion, and lifelong learning to more than 57,000 full- and part-time students in Multnomah, Washington, Yamhill, Clackamas, and Columbia counties. PCC has four comprehensive campuses, 10 education centers or areas served, and approximately 200 community locations in the Portland metropolitan area. The PCC district encompasses a 1,500-square-mile area in northwest Oregon and offers two-year degrees, one-year certificate programs, short-term training, alternative education, pre-college courses and life-long learning.

Visit PCC news on the web at http://news.pcc.edu/

For B-ROLL footage, visit PCC campus and student life highlight reel.

PCC Symphonic Band Gives Musicians Of All Backgrounds A Place To Play, Breathe And Belong (Photo) - 08/11/26

PORTLAND, Ore. – Alecia DeRoo often arrives at Portland Community College’s Sylvania Campus still wearing scrubs from her home-health nursing shift. Then she opens her oboe case and joins a Wednesday-night Symphonic Band class whose musicians range from high school students to people in their 80s.

About 30 players gather each term. Some are building toward a future in music; others are returning to instruments they set aside years, or decades ago. For DeRoo, who has played with the ensemble for about seven years, rehearsal is where a demanding workday gives way to breath, focus and sound.

“This is how I keep on playing,” DeRoo said. “I’ve just been a musician so much of my life, playing flute in college, and then learning oboe."

She is a 2012 PCC nursing alum who is a registered nurse. She is also a former flute minor at Southern Oregon University, but switched to oboe a few years ago and has been taking Matt Farris’ band class for about seven years.

"Coming here feels natural, and it’s stress-relieving,” DeRoo added.

The age span reflects PCC itself. In 2024–25, 53% of the college’s credit students were younger than 25, while 59% of its noncredit students were 30 to 64, and 16% of PCC’s non-credit students were 65 or older.

PCC's Music Program has five performance groups (Voices of Soul Choir, Chamber Choir, Chorus, Jazz Ensemble and Symphonic Band) along with private lessons and performance sessions. The Sylvania Campus offers two full years of university-transfer-level music coursework as well as general-interest classes, and PCC reports that students have continued at institutions including Portland State, the University of Oregon, Berklee, Eastman and the New England Conservatory.

In Farris’s rehearsal room, those separate demographics become one band. For some students, it is a weekly reset after a long shift at work, a return to an instrument set aside for decades, a link to a life in music or a new community built one rehearsal at a time.

The students’ experiences echo broader research on group music. Studies have found that six months participating in a community choir reduced loneliness and increased interest in life. In a separate randomized study of undergraduates, six weeks of group music therapy reduced self-reported stress and anxiety.

Music's Healing Qualities

The ensemble, based at the PCC Sylvania Campus, is led by an Oregon music educator whose own path began behind a drum set after he fell for the soulful R&B sound of Earth, Wind & Fire as a middle schooler in 1980s Montana. Today, Farris directs a group that brings together lower-division college students and PCC Community Education Program musicians, from high school students to retirees. The band is open to brass, woodwind and percussion instrumentalists, and rehearses every Wednesday at the Sylvania Campus.

“We sight-read, then vote on what we will perform,” Farris said. “From high schoolers to 80-year-olds, we tackle complex, fast-paced and highly dynamic music with a punchy and impactful brass section.”

That mix of challenge and welcome is what keeps students coming back.

For Emily Huber, the band became part of her recovery. After a 25-year break from clarinet, her best friend, also a musician, enrolled her in the class four years ago, partly because Huber was recovering from long COVID.

“The breathing exercise of playing made my physical therapist really excited,” Huber said. “I love playing at this level. Learning from Matt is not what I studied before in junior high, high school or even college.”

Huber said the class is both structured and collaborative. Students practice sight-reading, then help choose the music.

Students Come From International, Hollywood Backgrounds

Farris said that the student voice is central to the class.

“We play marches to more cinematic pieces, both vintage and new scores,” he said. “Students have a say in what we play and choose the group’s challenge piece that we take on to push ourselves.”

Cornet player Gregg McMickle is one of the ensemble’s veterans, with more than 12 years in the band. He brings loyalty and a Hollywood connection to the rehearsal room. A lifelong musician and former film prop master, McMickle worked on “Mr. Holland’s Opus,” the 1995 movie filmed in Portland that celebrated music teachers and the lasting influence they can have on students.

In Farris’ class, that influence is quieter but no less steady. The band currently averages about 30 students per term, with some non-credit students returning year after year. Their consistency gives the ensemble continuity and gives new students a place to land.

“No matter how long it’s been since they have played, we try to meet students where they are,” Farris said. “It’s a great community.”

For Marcos Ferraz, that community is part of a new chapter. Ferraz, who lives in Hillsboro and is originally from Brazil, built a career as a professional bass player. An early member of Silent, a melodic rock band from Rio de Janeiro, he later spent decades as a working musician.

“I was lucky to have one big hit in a band and saved my money,” Ferraz said. “I did not live a rock star’s lifestyle. It allowed me a life as a working musician.”

Ferraz eventually came to Portland for a custom-made cornet. Then he and his wife fell for the city.

“My wife and I loved this area so much we retired here,” said Ferraz, who has played cornet with the PCC Symphonic Band for three terms.

Fun Atmosphere Brings Them Back

Outside PCC, Farris directs the jazz and concert bands at Molalla High School and serves as a sergeant and percussion section leader with the Oregon Army National Guard’s 234th Army Band. His music education work also includes organizing high school honor bands and serving in leadership roles with the Oregon Music Education Association.

But on Wednesday evenings, the focus is the sound in the room: students counting measures, players listening across sections, a brass line finding its punch and woodwinds shaping the melody.

“PCC is a great atmosphere for learning, whether you are taking classes for credit or just for fun,” Farris said.

The friendships often continue after rehearsal, with band members gathering for dinner at nearby Sho Japanese Restaurant, which has welcomed the musicians and even stayed open late for them.

For Symphonic Band participants, the class is a place to breathe, learn, return and belong. It is a musical home.

For more information, visit pcc.edu/music, or to check out the Symphonic Band class's registration page.

About Portland Community College: Founded in 1961, Portland Community College is the largest post-secondary institution in Oregon and provides training, degree and certificate completion, and lifelong learning to more than 57,000 full- and part-time students in Multnomah, Washington, Yamhill, Clackamas, and Columbia counties. PCC has four comprehensive campuses, 10 education centers or areas served, and approximately 200 community locations in the Portland metropolitan area. The PCC district encompasses a 1,500-square-mile area in northwest Oregon and offers two-year degrees, one-year certificate programs, short-term training, alternative education, pre-college courses and life-long learning.

Visit PCC news on the web at http://news.pcc.edu/

For B-ROLL footage, visit PCC campus and student life highlight reel.

###

PCC Employee Turns $1,000 World Cup Ticket Into A Global Wave Of Kindness (Photo) - 07/22/26

SOUTHEAST PORTLAND, Ore. – A Portland Community College employee turned a $1,000 World Cup ticket into an international act of generosity: giving the coveted seat to a young Scotland supporter who had been scammed, then directing the unexpected wave of donations toward mental health services.

John MacLean, a Southeast Portland resident and longtime Timbers season-ticket holder, made the gift before Scotland’s first World Cup match in 28 years. What began as a split-second decision in a Boston pub soon spread across social media, reached broadcast audiences in the United Kingdom and helped carry the generosity forward through a Scottish mental health fundraiser.

MacLean, a lifelong Scotland supporter and a PCC employee for 12 years, traveled to Boston with his wife, Jodie, for Scotland’s opening match against Haiti. The national team was returning to the World Cup for the first time in 28 years, and the tournament was being played on U.S. soil. The Scots were bounced from the World Cup after a 3-0 loss to Brazil in group play on June 24, finishing third in Group C.

“We weren’t about to miss it,” he said.

MacLean had an extra ticket worth more than $1,000 that he planned to sell. Then he learned that a young Scotland supporter had paid a scammer for a ticket that never arrived.

He and Jodie gave the young fan called “Jack” a ticket for free with only a brief moment to do what felt right through his friends whom they met in a Boston pub. The gift allowed the supporter to experience Scotland’s return to the World Cup and stand alongside the Tartan Army, the passionate supporters of Scotland’s national team.

At PCC, MacLean is the finance and procurement manager in the Office of Planning and Capital Construction. A Scot who has lived in the United States for 27 years, he grew up playing and following soccer and has held Portland Timbers season tickets since the club began MLS play in 2011. He and Jodie, married 29 years, live in the Woodstock neighborhood. The couple met in Scotland while Jodie, an American, was studying at the Edinburgh College of Art.

The ticket giveaway might have ended there. Instead, the fan’s friends shared the story on social media, and messages soon flooded Jodie’s Instagram account.

“We were gobsmacked,” MacLean said. “We had no idea it would explode. There were no haters. It’s all been nice.”

Supporters then launched a GoFundMe campaign to reimburse the MacLeans. As donations surpassed the cost of the ticket, the couple decided the additional money should keep the cycle of generosity going. In total, they raised $3,000 after being reimbursed for the ticket.

They directed it to Craig Ferguson’s Tartan Trek, a fundraiser benefiting Scottish Action for Mental Health, known as SAMH. Ferguson, a Scottish soccer supporter and mental health advocate, walked more than 3,300 miles from the Los Angeles area to Boston in time for Scotland’s opening World Cup match. His campaign raised more than $1 million for mental health services in Scotland.

For MacLean, the story became about much more than soccer. One decision kept a stranger’s World Cup dream from being ruined by a scam; the response helped support people facing mental health challenges. The unexpected attention, including broadcast interviews in the United Kingdom, took some adjustment and provided an important lesson.

“It’s just so different talking about yourself,” MacLean said. “(But) if you are good to people and do the right thing, it grows.”

About Portland Community College: Founded in 1961, Portland Community College is the largest post-secondary institution in Oregon and provides training, degree and certificate completion, and lifelong learning to more than 57,000 full- and part-time students in Multnomah, Washington, Yamhill, Clackamas, and Columbia counties. PCC has four comprehensive campuses, 10 education centers or areas served, and approximately 200 community locations in the Portland metropolitan area. The PCC district encompasses a 1,500-square-mile area in northwest Oregon and offers two-year degrees, one-year certificate programs, short-term training, alternative education, pre-college courses and life-long learning.

Visit PCC news on the web at http://news.pcc.edu/

For B-ROLL footage, visit PCC campus and student life highlight reel.