GNTC, Georgia Power partner for electrical lineworker program
A new training program based at Georgia Northwestern Technical College’s Polk County campus will help provide valuable workers to electrical utilities thanks to strong partnerships locally and throughout the region.
GNTC hosted a ceremony at the campus in Rockmart on Monday, April 18, to sign a Memorandum of Understanding with both Georgia Power and Alabama Power, cementing their collaboration in establishing the school’s electrical lineworker training program.
Officials with both utilities were joined by GNTC administrators as well as local and state officials to mark the occasion, which took place on National Lineman Appreciation Day.
The new career pathway is just the most recent example of the cooperation between GNTC and the utilities, which are both owned by Southern Company. GNTC President Heidi Popham said the partnership between Georgia Power and the technical school goes back nearly 15 years, with a building on the Polk County campus serving as a Georgia Power training center.
“The addition of the new lineworker program at this campus reinforces Georgia Power’s continued commitment and investment to provide a skilled workforce. Georgia Power has proven to be one of the GNTC’s most committed partners. We are grateful for their continued support of our college and technical education. It is through partnerships like this that GNTC is able to provide opportunities for students and to meet the workforce needs of the communities that we serve,” Popham said.
Georgia Power has committed to provide instructors and training curriculum for the lineworker program, as well as the time and labor to construct a pole field on the campus. The company has also donated tools and climbing equipment, an aerial bucket truck and digger truck, and a utility trailer for the new program.
Georgia Power President and CEO Chris Womack said the work that GNTC and the Technical College System of Georgia has done in creating workforce development programs like this one is part of how the state can finish the good work and success that has been done the last few years.
“We look collaboratively all across the system, and even across his industry, making sure that we’re doing the things that must be done to make sure we’ve got the workforce that’s properly trained, but also making sure that we’re competing with other industries to make sure we have the supply of workers that we need to support our business to support our companies going forward,” Womack said.
“We need these lineworkers. Not just Georgia Power, but all of our industry counterparts. And this is a program that will be an avenue to supply workers to a lot of folks.”
Popham said partnerships across state and local governments, and the private sector have been critical in launching this training program.
To meet the program’s start date of Aug. 15, officials from the City of Rockmart and Polk County are working together to construct a temporary CDL driving range, and the Department of Driver Services provided guidance on implementing a five-week Class A commercial truck driving program that is a component of the electrical lineworker program.
“This partnership showcases how the community pulls together to meet the workforce demands of its employers and area region,” Popham said.
She also thanked the GNTC Board of Trustees, which unanimously voted to donate 17-acres adjacent to the campus to the state to establish a new, permanent driving range and pole field.
Popham said they have already begun accepting applications for the program, with 141 applicants so far. Of those, around 60 are minorities, 18 are veterans and just over 20 are from outside the Northwest Georgia area, including California, Colorado, New York, and Tennessee.
State Rep. Trey Kelley said he was proud to see the type of collaboration needed to bring something like this to Polk County.
“It’s something that’s exciting to see and it is a model. It is not only a model for other technical colleges to take for other states, but it is something that we need to see more as a state and as a country. This type of collaboration that says we’re not going to worry about who gets the credit, but we want to make people’s lives better,” he said.