Classroom, lab space added; RESA anticipated to lease space following renovation

Recall that Yavapai College has partnered with the Resa Corporation and the City of Prescott to train RESA employees.  (See Blog posting dated January 25, 2018.) RESA is a small company located in Prescott. It has been around for about twenty years and is known for providing orthopedic insoles. RESA and the City of Prescott approached the College in December 2018 indicating a need to quickly train future employees.  The College agreed to partner with the City and RESA.

The College has moved at lighting speed on this project.  It created a 14 week 19 credit training program in about a month. Training begins shortly.  It has taken less than a month to renovate 4,000 square feet at the Career and Technical Education Center at the Prescott airport that will act as an employee training center. The space at CTEC was re-purposed to become classroom and lab space.

The training at CTEC is related to the fabrication of insoles created through scanning and 3-D printing. Students enrolled at the College attend a variety of technology related courses and work as paid interns. If they are  successful, they are promised full time employment by RESA.  

The fist layer of photos below were contained in the February 2018 Governing Board agenda, which can be accessed by clicking here. The second layer of photos were taken either by the College Facilities staff or by RESA.  

Gifts, grants, tuition and taxpayer money results in fantastic CTEC–Unfortnately, about 1/3 high school students in County don’t have access to the facility

Working closely with the West County High School Mountain Institute Joint Technical Education District (JTED), Yavapai College has created a state-of-the-art Career and Technical Education Center at the Prescott airport.  The total investment over the past nine years including gifts, contributions, tuition, and taxpayer revenue is close to $20 million dollars. Recently, the College put several million into  completely remodeling the Center.

Unfortunately, high school students from the East side of the County (Verde Valley) do not have access to this wonderful facility.  Only high school students on the West side of the County.

President Penelope Wills’ indicated to the Clarkdale town council that if the Verde Valley wanted a similar facility on a smaller scale, it would have to do so on its own.  Incredible!

The following video provides a three minute snapshot of a portion of the CTEC remodeling projects that are just now being completed along with some of the new state-of-the-art machinery.

CTEC Parking lot upgrades; space for High School Mountain Academy; landscaping 

Construction at the Career and Technical Education Center at the Prescott Airport continues unabated despite continued drop in enrollment, which now measures something around 6,000 students in ten years (using College headcount data).  The most recent report from the College on construction at CTEC came at the August 9, 2016 District Governing Board meeting.

The improvements at CTEC include new offices for the Mountain Institute, the JTED for the West side of Yavapai County.  There was also extensive work done to landscape CTEC and redo the parking lots that surround it.  All of the improvements are being paid for by property taxes and tuition.  This includes the facility constructed for the high school Mountain Institute program that benefits the West side of the County but not the East side. (It’s a great idea; too bad the East County is left out.)

The photos that follow were contained in the Agenda provided to the District Governing Board on August 9, 2016.

Will apply grant towards engineering technician training; how about the Verde Valley?

The National Science Foundation (NSF) awarded Yavapai College a $855,350 grant. It will be used at CTEC to provide among other things internships with employers. The grant is expected to provide up to 20 student interns with work-based experiences through paid internships with local business partners.

Currently, CTEC provides students with hands-on training in Applied Pre-Engineering, Computer Numerical Control, Integrated Systems Engineering and other vocational programs. These programs are open to West County high school students but not East County high school students. CTEC is also difficult to reach from the East side of the County by part-time workers, single parents, and the unemployed.

The grant is also intended to help fund equipment enhancements and outreach events for rural high school students. How much of the grant, the criteria and which high schools will receive the assistance is not clear.

The grant may to some extent duplicate training funds that were already available under programs administered by the Northern Arizona Council of Governments (NACOG). NACOG provides employers and communities access to economic development funding within the region.

NACOG supports programs to assist economically distressed areas, planning regions, cities and counties to undertake significant economic development planning, policy making and implementation efforts. It may match employers and students as interns where there is an agreement with Yavapai College regarding a particular program. Currently, it works closely with a for-profit training facility located in Cottonwood, which reflects past difficulties NACOG has experienced with Yavapai College.

Recall that in 2012, Yavapai College received $1.87 million of a $13,477,799 grant awarded to a consortium of five Arizona community colleges to train people for high-skill, high-wage employment and advancement in energy and mining industries. All of the funds received by the College were spent on the West side of the County at CTEC. Much of it went for developing the line-worker program over there.

Keeping the public in the Dark. Because the College District Governing Board does not require detailed reports regarding grant expenditures, the public will probably never know how much was spent where and for what of this grant.  

EQUITY IS NOT IN THE WILLS’ POLITICAL AGENDA 

Community College President Penelope Wills is not about to return any of the excess millions of dollars paid by Verde Valley taxpayers to the Valley to build a CTEC-like facility over here.  That would be equitable. Recall that since 2007 the College has pumped an estimated $16 million of primary taxpayer revenue into the CTEC facility at the Prescott airport.  It’s a terrific facility.  How about a smaller similar facility in the Verde Valley?  Are you kidding?

From Wills’ perspective, none of the taxpayer property tax money should be used in the Verde Valley for similar and obviously smaller facility.  Instead, she claims there have been discussions about bonding and a decision made to encourage VACTE to float a General Obligation bond on its own.  (A College-wide bond would involve the College and she clearly does not want to be a part of helping the Verde Valley in this way.)

So, with County property primary taxes paying $16 million for CTEC, $5 million for a new Arts building (now under construction); $4 million for the Prescott Valley Campus; $10.75 million for a Chiller on the Prescott Campus; $3 million for a soccer field; $5 million for the Performing Arts Center, and $7 million for renovated dormitories, one can see the extreme selfishness of her view.  Oh, well.  And the fact she makes decisions without public discussions at Governing Board meetings is standard operating fodder in Yavapai County. 

Here is what she told the Clarkdale Town Council when the CTEC issues was raised.

“There have been discussions about should we as a College bond for that and bring a similar facility over here. I don’t think we want to go that direction. This is why. Because it would require if we bond for it it would have to go across the County. The Valley Academy has the ability to bond. They can bond for a building that is just within the Verde Valley. It would have a much higher chance of passing in this day of tax restrictions. So, we’re always looking for opportunities to work more closely together to bring more programs in here. And to have that pipeline coming into the College. And that to a large part explains the success of CTEC. Because of the Mountain Institute JTED and that strong pipeline coming into the College. So we’re looking for opportunities there. And I always look to see, o.k., . . . what is possible; let’s go for it. So I am very pleased that we are working very closely with Steve Dochery on that.”