Five questions with Lindsey Turner
Lindsey Turner likes to help people find their way in life.
As the new director of Wichita Technical Institute's East Campus, at Central and Woodlawn, she gets to do just that.
Before that, she had been a career counselor for WTI for nearly five years.
Turner, 31, is a native of Wichita who went to Wichita State University, where she got a bachelor's degree in marketing, advertising and communications.
Before working at WTI, she was a family program coordinator for the U.S. Army Reserve, where she was responsible for a four-state region.
As a career counselor, where did you direct students?
"The medical field is still strong and still growing with the upcoming changes caused by the health care reform law. And people are always going to need medical care."
Why go to WTI?
"We're at a school that allows us to use more up-to-date curriculum and skills and software. They walk into the clinicals with hands-on experience rather than just learning from a book.... Those who go into medical assisting love patient interaction, getting blood, doing the charting and sitting in on patient exams. And we have the medical insurance coding program for the analytical types who enjoy working with insurance companies."
What kind of work did you do for the Army Reserve?
"The Department of Defense hired us to take care of families with soldiers in deployment. I traveled all the time and did briefings for families with soldiers going on deployment on what kind of benefits and services are available and briefings for families in preparation for when the soldiers came home to reintegrate."
What is the best part of your present job?
"It boils down to students come here to change their lives and all of us on staff and the instructors get to know every one of our students and who they are as individuals. And we invest a lot in helping them get and keep a job. We invest in them as individuals and as medical professionals, seeing them grow and change and graduate and get a job."
What's something about you that would surprise people?
"I'd eventually like to own a motorcycle."
This story was originally published September 22, 2011 at 12:00 AM with the headline "Five questions with Lindsey Turner."