MaineHealth Recruiting for Two CNA Programs Including May 1 Paid Mid Coast

MaineHealth is recruiting students for a short-term paid certified nursing assistant training that "begins on May 11th and will run until June 18th," with participating sites listed as MaineHealth Lincoln Hospital in Damariscotta, MaineHealth Mid Coast Hospital in Brunswick, and MaineHealth Maine Medical Center in Biddeford and Portland. The system’s LinkedIn post, from an account with 29,522 followers, invited prospective students to "Earn while you learn and train to be a CNA!" and asked interested applicants to contact cna@mainehealth.org and sign up for virtual information sessions on Thursday, February 19 from 6-7 p.m., Thursday, March 5 from 10-11 a.m., and Thursday, March 19 from 6-7 p.m.

Maine Medical Center Portland’s longstanding CNA offering remains a separate, recurring pathway into the role. MHMMC’s program page notes that "MHMMC Portland has provided expert CNA training since 1998. More than 2,000 students have graduated to date." The MHMMC course is described as a 6-week, state-approved class offered six times per year, with "32 hours of training over 4 days per week." MHMMC states that "Students are paid at a rate of $17.34 per hour plus benefits while they are in class and on clinical units. Textbooks and workbooks are provided at no charge. At the end of the program, students take the state CNA certification examination at no cost to them." MHMMC also requires successful graduates to work at MHMMC Portland as CNAs for at least one year at a minimum of 20 hours per week.

A separate, free fall cohort at MaineHealth Lincoln Hospital was detailed for Sept. 29 to Nov. 20, 2025. Under the headline "Free CNA training program now accepting applications," that seven-week course ran Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., with the first day on Monday, Sept. 29, and clinical days from 6:45 a.m. to 2:45 p.m. The Lincoln Hospital offering was presented in partnership with Central Lincoln County Adult Education and included classroom instruction, skills labs and clinical experience at Cove’s Edge in Damariscotta, St. Andrews Village in Boothbay Harbor and MHLH. Accepted students could apply to an optional CNA Apprenticeship Program described as a "paid training opportunity in exchange for an 18-month work commitment at Cove’s Edge or St. Andrews Village following graduation." The announcement noted that apprentices are temporary employees of MHLH, receive additional on-the-job and professional development training, and that "space in the apprenticeship program is limited, and acceptance is not guaranteed based upon completion of the training."

The May short-term recruitment was explicitly tied to a collaboration with the Maine Adult Education Association in the LinkedIn materials, while the fall Lincoln Hospital cohort named Central Lincoln County Adult Education as the partner. Contact paths differ by program: for the May paid training and virtual sessions the listed email is cna@mainehealth.org; for the Lincoln Hospital fall program the contacts are phone 207-563-4540 and email cna@lchcare.org, with applications routed through careersatmainehealth.org and an Aug. 29, 2025 application deadline for that cohort.

MaineHealth’s organizational profile emphasizes scale across the state: the system describes itself as a not-for-profit integrated network aiming for its communities to be "the healthiest in America," operating a Level 1 trauma medical center plus eight additional licensed hospitals, with more than 2,000 employed providers and approximately 23,000 care team members serving 1.1 million residents. For Coastal Maine, the combination of a May paid cohort with local sites in Brunswick and Damariscotta and the earlier Lincoln Hospital apprenticeship model represents immediate staffing and training pipelines tied to Cove’s Edge, St. Andrews Village and Mid Coast Hospital, each of which will be affected by the programs’ post-graduation work commitments of 18 months or, in the case of MHMMC graduates, one year at minimum 20 hours per week. Contact cna@mainehealth.org for May program details and info-session sign-up; for the Lincoln Hospital fall cohort, call 207-563-4540 or email cna@lchcare.org and apply at careersatmainehealth.org.