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Doing skills isn't the only thing that students need to learn while in your care. I too would never trust vitals on a critical patient taken by a student, or a newer medic, or Fire, or anyone but me or a trusted partner that I had experience with. There's no shame there. At least if we're both using 'critical' to mean in imminent danger of losing their life. I once ran on a home invader that had his right arm nearly severed by a shotgun. I let a student start IVs, pack the wound, push narcs, etc. Other than his dangling arm and being really pissed off for being shot "for no reason" (as he had a knife, not a gun) I was confident that he wasn't trying to die. And for the record his condition led to my decisions, not a desire for inferior care secondary to the cause of his injury. With skills, there should be about a bazillion to one ratio of critical patients to non critical patients that they can practice on. Set them to doing something menial on the critical patients, printing out ECG to examine, bagging, holding pressure, prepping equipment if you want..Something that allows them to participate, but still have some mental energy to expend on observation. But allowing them to see a more experienced way to do things while showing that at all times patient priorities overcome any desires of the medic or the student are pretty friggin' valuable things to learn too...They don't stop learning simply because they stopped moving. We set an example, either good or bad, every minute that we are together with them... If you're apologizing for prioritizing efficient, focused care on a critical patient instead of the student's education then you're cheating them out of perhaps one of the most important lessons to be learned in the back of an ambulance.