Training that works

The new workforce center at CCAC is on target

The Community College of Allegheny County doesn’t get the attention that the city’s research universities do, but it plays an important role in the region’s economy and education system. That point was underscored last week when Gov. Tom Wolf, county Executive Rich Fitzgerald and other officials announced plans for a new Workforce Training Center on CCAC’s Allegheny Campus on the North Side.

CCAC already has a workforce development center in North Fayette and provides training in other locations. However, the new center will provide more convenient access for city students and enable the college to better tailor its programs to employer demand. According to an Allegheny Conference on Community Development study last year, the region will be short as many as 80,000 workers by 2025. With this center, CCAC should be better positioned to help meet those needs.

Affordability, access and focus on employer need are among the college’s greatest strengths. The new center will provide training in autonomous technology, important because of driverless car research here by Uber, Ford and Carnegie Mellon University. It will provide training in additive manufacturing, important because of GE’s $39 million investment in an advanced manufacturing research center in Findlay as well as 3-D printer manufacturing by ExOne in North Huntingdon. It will train nurse’s aides to support the region’s burgeoning health care industry and aging population.

Those are just a few of the programs to be offered. CCAC intends to carry out its mission through a combination of degree and certificate programs. A growing number of high-demand occupations do not require bachelor’s degrees. Others require skills typically provided by a community college on top of a bachelor’s degree. It all means CCAC’s work is more important than ever.

CCAC, which marked its 50th anniversary last year, has worked diligently to meet the needs of its community. Addressing employer demand is but one example. It has also shown impressive outreach to students and prospective students — such as working with recipients of the Pittsburgh Promise to make their college experience as successful as possible, offering “Midnight Welding” classes to students who cannot attend at other times and partnering with the Homewood-Brushton YMCA to offer a free course in music technology as a way of interesting young people in college.

The new center, the $20 million first phase of which is to be funded by state and local sources, will be designed to provide CCAC’s students with the best in technology and other educational amenities. They deserve no less. It will be a green building, reflecting the region’s livability and new economy.

In its strategic plan, the college says it aims to be the “region’s premier provider of workforce training.” The new center will help it meet that goal. It also will give the college new opportunities for being a good neighbor.