North Carolina’s South Piedmont Community College will use a $170,549 grant to enhance its fire/rescue training program. The Investment in Short Term Workforce Training Grant comes from the North Carolina Community College System (NCCCS). SPCC, in conjunction with fire/rescue partners Monroe Fire Department and Union County, will apply the funds towards a live fire-training structure and needed equipment.
Arizona
Mohave Community College (MCC) received a $200,000 donation from Jim Childe, a retired attorney and former MCC instructor. The funds will establish the Kathy Hodel Outstanding Student Award, which will provide $10,000 each year to one outstanding student.
The award honors Kathy Hodel, who has worked on behalf of the MCC Foundation and other local non-profit groups. She raised nearly $1 million for the MCC library on the Lake Havasu City campus, which now bears her name. Hodel is living with terminal bone cancer.
When she heard that Childe wanted to honor her by putting her name on the award she was overwhelmed.
“What a gift! And what I like most is that it’s going to education,” Hodel said. “It is dear to my heart, this is a heartfelt gift.”
California
Chabot College’s outreach efforts will benefit from a nearly $30 million U.S. Department of Education grant. The college is one of 10 local organizations in Cal State East Bay’s Hayward Promise Neighborhood (HPN) partnership, which received the grant. HPN focuses on alleviating generational poverty, ensures residents feel safe and have access to education and healthcare, and coordinates and aligns resources, making them accessible to local families.
“The Hayward Promise Neighborhood grant has provided Chabot College the opportunity to greatly enhance our outreach and service to communities [that are] facing many challenges — by strengthening our community’s educational and service partnerships, and by helping us to evolve new ones,” said Chabot College President Susan Sperling.
HPN serves more than 10,000 residents and 6,000 students in Hayward’s Jackson Triangle neighborhood — one of the poorest areas within the city.
Illinois
Prairie State College will take job training on the road, thanks to a $940,000 grant from the U.S. Commerce Department. The college plans to purchase two semi-truck trailers and outfit them with welding and machining equipment in order to provide training to businesses in areas where training is difficult to access.
Massachusetts
MassBay Community College has been gifted $100,000 by the Gladys Brooks Foundation to support high-achieving single parent students. The Gladys Brooks Foundation Endowed Scholarship will help single parent students in their second year at MassBay who are on track to graduate with an associate degree and plan to transfer to a four-year college or university. At least six students will be awarded scholarships each year.
Washington
Five Washington community colleges received grants from College Spark to implement Guided Pathways. Clover Park Technical College, Lower Columbia College, Renton Technical College, Spokane Falls Community College and Tacoma Community College will each receive $500,000 over five years. The State Board for Community and Technical Colleges (SBCTC) is providing matching funding. They are the second cohort of College Spark Guided Pathways grant recipients.
Some goals of the initiative include development of meta majors (broad fields of interest), program/degree maps, enhanced intake and advising practices, accelerated remediation and multiple math pathways to better suit different types of intended careers. SBCTC will provide technical assistance and coaches and facilitate opportunities for the colleges to learn from other Guided Pathways colleges and experts in the field of institutional change management.
“Ensuring that all our students succeed is our highest priority, and Guided Pathways is another way to encourage that success,” Renton Technical College President Kevin McCarthy said in a release.
