11/05/2018

Donations Rolling into New Longview Manufacturing Academy

A new Longview academy for manufacturing skills has received more than $600,000 in private donations from at least 20 companies as the center aims to recruit students from more area schools.

Along with the financial gifts, the East Texas Advanced Manufacturing Academy has enrolled 37 students in its inaugural semester, retired businesswoman and Longview Economic Development Corp. board member Peggy Vaughan said during an update to the board.

“It’s been really positive,” Vaughan said in delivering the update. Board member John Martin noted the enrollment total nearly matched the academy’s first-semester goal of 40 students.

LEDCO gave $1.2 million to help start the academy, which is teaching students from Longview-area high schools skills in machining, instrumentation and electrical work. Several local companies, LEDCO, an education foundation initiated by the Longview Chamber of Commerce and four school districts serving Longview students founded the academy in the former Brew Honda dealership on West South Street.

Vaughan and others continue to seek donations. Meanwhile, she said a group of companies including Nucor and Eastman Chemical Co. are seeking ways “to focus on how to articulate to counselors the skill sets on instrumentation and electrical.” Another group involving Crosby Lebus Co., AAON Coil and Komatsu are pursuing internship programs for the academy, while Sanders and other directors are taking the academy’s recruitment message to area schools.

Sanders recently told the News-Journal that some of those school districts include Kilgore, Gladewater, New Diana and Tatum and that directors are reaching out to counselors and students to talk to them about machining and instrumentation and electrical work industries and their potential earning power.

Sanders added that the academy “hit a home run” in securing instructor Steve Henderson, who has decades of experience in machining work and teaching.

“He kind of came with the best of both worlds — experience in the industry for years and years and he’s taught,” Sanders said.

The academy also has caught the attention of a leader in dual-credit education programs throughout the state, Vaughan said.

“He said this is the most innovative program that he has seen in what he called rural Texas, and he’s referred this model to a workforce program that is focused on rural parts of Texas,” Vaughan said.

The academy building itself is serving other roles. State Rep. Jay Dean plans to hold a town hall meeting there in November, and a local Rotary Club also has set a meeting there, she said.

Remodeling of the academy from its auto dealership shell didn’t come without obstacles. Vaughan noted everything went well except the building needed more electrical work than expected and converting the former breezeway between the main building and the former service department into a pedestrian walkway, as well as other paneling work, added about $30,000 to costs.

“That money is currently being expected to be paid from donations,” she said.