John Salmon First Responder and Health Care Professional

It’s something no one really wants to think about. You’re driving home from work, or returning from a late-night dinner. Maybe you’re in a remote location, or maybe it’s a busy city street. Suddenly, with little or no warning, you’re in an accident, and it’s a bad one. Your life is now in someone else’s hands, and you can only hope it’s someone like John Salmon.

John Salmon First Responder and Health Care Professional

John graduated from Daytona State College with an Associate of Science in Nursing in December 2017, but his resumé contains one set of acronyms after another, all of them describing the various degrees and certifications he has earned, or the tests he has passed in his career. EMT, RN, LEO, ACLS, TEAS and NCLEX are some of them. You may not know what all of them mean, you just need to know it means you’re in good hands if John Salmon is with you in a tight spot.

To say John has followed a winding road to get where he is today would be accurate, but in a geographical sense, it wasn’t a long one.

John is a Daytona Beach native and a 1974 graduate of Mainland High School, right across the street from what, at the time, was known as Daytona Beach Community College.

For him, there was never a question where he was going. “I figured I’d be graduating from high school, then I’d be going to college, and Daytona State would be the one. I didn’t consider anywhere else.”

While still a teenager, John became a volunteer firefighter with Volusia County, the beginning of his career as a first responder. In that role, he was often involved in rescue calls and found himself fascinated with the medical side of these emergencies. That led him to look into Daytona State’s EMT program and begin a relationship with the College that has now spanned almost five decades.

After earning his certification as an EMT, John began working full-time for Beacon Ambulance, a private EMS provider under contract with Volusia County. It wasn’t long after, that Daytona State began offering an EMT II, or Paramedic program as it came to be known. It was one of the first in the state of Florida, which in 1976, had implemented a statewide standard of Basic Life Support with EMTs, and Advanced Life Support with Paramedics. Since he was already an EMT, John decided to take the next step, enrolled again at Daytona State and became one of the first certified paramedics in Volusia County.

John remained with Beacon Ambulance for many years and often trained the company’s paramedics in his role as a supervisor. He was also hired by the City of Edgewater as a reserve police officer, prompting a return to Daytona State and its Law Enforcement Academy, but he realized that was not where his true interests were. “I liked EMS more than I liked law enforcement,” John admitted.

Nevertheless, John eventually left both behind as he and his wife, Mary, launched their own successful business ventures in the Daytona Beach area, and all of his licenses expired. But in 2013, he got the itch again, and there was only one place John could think of that would help him scratch it. He also had the full support of Mary, who knew if John was ever going to go back to school, that was the time to do it. “I didn’t want him to go through the rest of his life thinking, what if I’d done it,” Mary said. “When you get into your late 50s and early 60s, you look at life a lot differently. I very much encouraged him to do it.”

“I knew there were some places hiring, and I had all of this experience, so I enrolled again in the Law Enforcement Academy at Daytona State’s Advanced Technology College,” John said. “I graduated top of the class, and they even let me speak at graduation, but I told Mary that since I was in that school mode again, why not get my EMT license back too. So the day after I graduated from the Law Enforcement Academy, I started the EMT program at Daytona State. I walked in the room and saw one of the instructors who teaches in the program, and he said, ‘John, what are you doing here? You taught me!’”

John was told he had some of the highest scores they had ever seen in the EMT program, but he emphasized how much he studied to get them, even with all of the real-world experience he already had. He scored so high, he earned the nickname “Mr. 100%” but there was more to come. Having regained his law enforcement and EMT licenses, John decided to do something he had always considered, but never pursued. “I was thinking, since I’m in school mode, if I ever had the chance to get my RN license, now would be the time to do it because I really care about people, and I want to help them one-on-one.”

To enroll in the RN program, however, John discovered he would need several prerequisites, which he didn’t have. All of his previous time at Daytona State had been spent in certificate programs that didn’t require them. “I had to go back and start at square one with A&P (anatomy and physiology), math, English, and all this different stuff I had to do for my associate’s degree. I was thinking, ‘What am I doing?’, but I ended up graduating with almost a 4.0 GPA.”

John’s academic success landed him in the Phi Theta Kappa Honor Society, and upon graduating in 2017 with his AS in Nursing, he was inducted into the Alpha Delta Nu Honor Society as well. He credits Daytona State with preparing him for the National Council Licensure Exam (NCLEX), and because of the courses he took previously, including Advanced Cardiac Life Support (ACLS), he was also able pass the Florida State Paramedic Exam. “Thanks to Daytona State College and its wonderful programs and instructors, I have all of my licenses back, and can now practice as an RN and paramedic in order to make a difference in individual lives.”

It’s the ability to make a difference that has motivated John through every twist and turn of the winding road he started following in 1974. “Daytona State has been a part of me forever.”