ASU’s Clinical Laboratory Sciences Program was approved to be disestablished by the Academic Affairs Committee of the Arizona Board of Regents at the June 3 meeting.

However, the Board will have to fully approve the disestablishment in a later meeting this month.

Provost Elizabeth Capaldi decided it was necessary to cut the program in order to save money.

“It’s a very expensive program with not that many students in it,” Capaldi said.

The degree program prepares students to be clinical lab scientists.

She said that for the minimal number of students in the program, the cost is too much, considering the current budget crisis.

“This is the most expensive [program] with the smallest number of students,” Capaldi said at the meeting.

Capaldi said in an e-mail that ASU would save $460,200 by cutting the program.

In order to keep the degree program available, she said a fee of $1,700 per semester per student was requested.

“Our academic strategic plan stated if this fee had been approved by ABOR, we would have kept the program,” Capaldi said.

However, the Board didn’t consider program fees — only a surcharge that was less than the requested fee.

She said this program would be cut above others because of the expense and the fact that there doesn’t seem to be a large demand for the program by students.

“There’s just not a lot of students who want to do this,” Capaldi said.
She said there is a possibility the program could be re-established when the economy is better if there is a need.

The other two state universities don’t have this program either.

Community colleges only have a two-year degree program for medical laboratory technicians, not clinical laboratory scientists (also called medical technologists), according to Lauren Roberts, a clinical associate professor who has been teaching in the CLS Program for 24 years.

“To be a clinical laboratory scientist, it requires a four-year degree,” she said.

She said medical laboratory technicians do more basic laboratory tests, while clinical laboratory scientists “perform advanced testing that requires independent judgment.”

Diana Mass, director of the Clinical Laboratory Sciences Program, is opposed to its disestablishment.

“I don’t think that they’re thinking of the value that these graduates apply to the community,” Mass said.

She said she realizes the program is expensive, but clinical lab scientists are needed.

“The program provides a much-needed service to the medical community,” Mass said.

She added that her students had jobs set before they even graduated.
“Here we are graduating students who are job-ready, yet we are closing the program,” she said.

She said the jobs will pay from $48,000 to $50,000 a year.
Clinical lab scientists analyze samples and determine if someone is ill or needs surgery, among other responsibilities, Mass said.
“It was my graduates who would determine if the patients had the [swine] flu,” she said.

Mass said there were around 47 freshmen coming into the program this fall, but now they have to be directed to other majors if the Board decides to finalize the committee’s decision.

“All these students are going to be advised to choose a different major,” she said.

In May 2011, 25 students will be able to graduate from the program.
According to Capaldi, there are 97 students in the program and 29 in upper division.

Mass said that there are more than 100 students in the program, either in upper division or lower division.

“It is a small program,” she said. “This kind of a program requires lab work where the students demonstrate competence that they can do the work.”

The program has two labs, and each can hold up to 13 students.
“Our laboratories only hold so many students, and there’s a lot of one-to-one teaching going on,” Mass said.

She said she is concerned because DeVry University will take from 1 1/2 to two years to get their clinical laboratory sciences program running, and there is a need in Arizona for clinical lab scientists.
“Arizona continues to grow in population, and we are building more and more hospitals,” she said.

However, Capaldi said that according to the DeVry University Web site, there is already a program.

“I find it to be unfortunate that the academic committee approved it,” Mass said.

Reach the reporter at
reweaver@asu.edu