Is This Program for You?

Students entering the Clinical Medical Assistant program should:

• Show commitment to the patient.
• Enjoy teamwork.
• Deal effectively with stressful, fast paced work.
• Possess effective listening skills.
• Communicate well with others through oral and written means.
• Have good mental dexterity.
• Demonstrate attention to detail.

Program Basics

• Technical diploma, completion in mid-March.
• Day classes.
• High school articulation courses accepted.
• Financial aid available.
• Classes start in August.
• Students must achieve a "C" grade or better (78%) in each course of the program curriculum to be eligible to progress.

Cost of Attendance (COA) 26-27

Cost of Attendance (COA) is a total of all the usual expenses of being a student. The COA sets the maximum amount of financial aid a student can receive.

Based on Wisconsin Residents.

Approximate school costs are for a full-time (12 credit) student over a semester span of 17 weeks.

Fees are legislated by the Wisconsin Technical College System Board.

These costs are estimates and are subject to change without notice.

Admission Requirements

• Submit Application

Academic Preparedness Requirements

Before you can be fully accepted into your program, you need to complete the requirements below. These are the same requirements you may see in your SWTC Student Portal.


• Submit Official High School, College, Military Transcripts, and Test Scores (Not Required)
  Have documents sent directly to:
  • Email: admissions@swtc.edu
  • Mail: Southwest Wisconsin Technical College, Attn: Admissions, 1800 Bronson Blvd, Fennimore, WI 53809
• Meet with Your Advisor for an Admissions Meeting
  Schedule an admission meeting with your program advisor to complete your student success plan, including a career assessment and academic map and support plan.
  
  To schedule your meeting, go to the Appointments page. Find your advisor in the list, then select Make an Appointment under their contact information.
  
  Appointments are available on campus or virtually.

If you want to check which of these requirements you still need to complete, log in to your SWTC Student Portal, go to My Profile → Document Center, and make sure All Programs is selected.

Program Outcomes

At the completion of the program, students are expected to be able to:

• Perform medical office administrative functions
• Provide patient care in accordance with regulations, policies, laws, and patient rights
• Perform medical laboratory procedures
• Demonstrate professionalism in a healthcare setting
• Demonstrate safety and emergency practices in a healthcare setting

Technical Skill Attainment (TSA)

This TSA scoring guide will be used to document your attainment of technical program outcomes for the Medical Assistant Degree. To meet the requirements on the scoring guide, you will be asked to draw upon the skills and concepts that have been developed throughout the program and are necessary for successful employment in your field. Results will be used to inspire continual improvement of teaching and learning in Wisconsin Technical College System. In addition, this assessment will provide feedback to you about your performance.

A graduate of the program will have the potential to be employed as a:

• Medical Assistant: Prepares a patient for examination or treatment, takes vital signs, sterilizes instruments, performs simple lab tests, performs electrocardiograms, and assists the physician as needed.
• Claims Analyst: Processes insurance claims on a computer.
• EKG Technician: Operates and maintains electrocardiographic machines, records the heart's electrical activity, and provides data for diagnosis and treatment of heart ailments by physicians.
• Laboratory Assistant: Performs simple laboratory procedures and venipunctures to collect blood specimens.
• Medical Records Clerk: Handles all patient medical records in areas such as progress notes and pulls records of patients on a daily basis.
• Medical Office Assistant: Performs a variety of duties such as bookkeeping, typing, filing, record keeping, customer relations, telephoning, general correspondence, appointments, and patient accounts.
• Phlebotomist: Draws blood samples from patients for lab tests and blood donations. Performs related duties involving patient care and specimen processing with strict adherence to safety procedures to prevent transmission of infectious diseases.

With additional education and/or work experience, graduates may find other opportunities for employment, including:

• Medical Office Manager
• Medical Transcriptionist
• Insurance Coding Specialist

Southwest Tech's Career Services Center offers services to assist students looking for job placement.

Credit for Prior Learning

Experience Pays! You've Been There... You've Done That... Let's See If You Can Get Credit For It!

Credit for prior learning gives you opportunities to earn credit for college-level knowledge that you have already acquired. This may be the result of work or volunteer experiences, certifications, apprenticeships, military training, extensive self-instruction, or professional development. Credit for Prior Learning affords you the opportunity to accelerate the completion of your educational goals.

For more information on Credit for Prior Learning see our Credit for Prior Learning page.

Courses that may have Credit for Prior Learning options:

Accreditation Status

The Southwest Wisconsin Technical College Clinical Medical Assistant Program is accredited by the Commission on Accreditation of Allied Health Education Programs (www.caahep.org), upon the recommendation of the Medical Assisting Education Review Board (MAERB).

In compliance with Medical Assistant Education Review Board (MAERB) Policy 210, Southwest Tech proudly provides the following data for public review. The information provided in the table below represents the 2020-2024 Cumulative cohort outcomes associated with Southwest Tech’s Clinical Medical Assistant Technical Diploma.