A pioneer in online learning, The North America Training Institute (NATI) launched a Web-based gambling prevention program that is piquing the interest of health care providers not only in America but in Europe, Ghana and Hong Kong.
The program, Counseling the Pathological Gambler, all started with four people, a computer and a vision right in Duluth.
Elizabeth George is the chief executive officer of the NATI, based in the Torrey Building on Superior Street.
For nearly a decade, George said, NATI conducted a 60-hour course on counseling pathological gamblers in a traditional classroom setting.
Lynn John Rambeck, Psy. D., CAS, whom George describes as the most gifted teacher she has ever heard, has taught the course since 1991.
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Rambeck has been providing treatment for people with gambling addictions in Minnesota for more than a decade. He developed the course in conjunction with Hazelden, an addiction treatment facility.
Despite the growing success and international recognition of the course, George said she kept hearing the same complaint from health care providers about the cost of spending time away from a busy practice and the cost of travel to attend the course.
"It was then we began the design to convert the classroom course into an accredited interactive Web-based learning experience," George said. Working without a model, the Web site went from an idea to a working product in about nine months and has been running for more than a year.
The online course has all of the makings of a classroom setting, including class policies, goals and objectives, opportunities to correspond with the instructor, quizzes and assignments.
NATI's online prevention course is used by several colleges in neighboring states for graduate credits.
Minnesota also offers scholarships to help cover the tuition of the online class, which is $1,500 for the 60-hour course.
The course is approved by the American Psychological Association, the National Association of Alcohol and Drug Abuse Counselors and the American Academy of Health Care Providers in the Addictive Disorders and National Council on Problem Gambling.
Offering the gambling prevention course online also addresses the need for prevention health care providers in rural areas, which is one reason the Minnesota Department of Human Services endorses the program.
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"Right now there are less than 200 people in Minnesota certified to treat gambling addictions," George said. "This course is an awesome opportunity to add to what you have. It's much needed and opens career opportunities for people entering the field of mental health."
One of the barriers preventing further expansion of the online course is that it is English-based, but George said that is one thing NATI is working on.
George said hundreds of people have graduated from the program already, and the number of participants is increasing every day.
Brandon Hall, a senior at the University of Minnesota Duluth, has worked at NATI for two years and was part of the driving force behind the construction of the Web site.
Along with Dan Vanderwyest and Andy George, Hall put together the Web site with computer skills that are mostly self-taught.
The program was designed to be as user-friendly as possible, but Hall said occasionally he will field a question from a student.
"I think it's a small percentage of people who have concerns with it," said Hall. Hall said there are always new things to add or revamp to the program, but for the most part the team is amazed at the few problems they've encountered.
For more information on the online program, Counseling the Pathological Gambler, visit http://www.nati.org/oll .
