WNCC targets business training

An assisted-living facility in Douglas County will soon be built with the help of two dozen or so high school students, the Building Association of Western Nevada and Western Nevada Community College.

The students will help construct the building roomby- room as part of a new class this fall being developed by WNCC in partnership with BAWN.

The class is the result of new effort by the Carson City community college to reach out to employers, including businesses and government, to meet their ongoing education and training needs.

That effort is part of WNCC's business and industry department run by former businessman Tim Morsani.

Morsani, who once owned the Carson City Ford auto dealership and joined WNCC in January, runs it like a business.

"We contact businesses, like we would any client, and find out which of our products they might purchase, or what products we could create that they might be interested in."

The building class, for example, came about after Morsani and others met with BAWN and found out that the local construction industry had a never-ending need for new talent, including carpenters, electricians, and plumbers, as well as a need to keep workers' skills up to date with such things as classes on AutoCAD, a software application for design.

The college put together a construction curriculum and started marketing it to Carson City and Douglas County high schools.

About 28 students have enrolled so far, said Morsani, and each will receive high school credits for the course.

BAWN is providing scholarships for the program.

The program will consist of a few weeks of basic safety classes, then students move outdoors to build modules.

"They'll do everything from framing to siding to sheetrock and plumbing," he said.

"That should take a couple semesters."

Eventually, the finished modules will be trucked down to Douglas County where they'll be assembled as part of a new living center for seniors.

The building class is just one of many courses the college's business and industry department has going.

The classes are often company-specific and held on site at a business.

If college credit is earned then some of the costs are defrayed by the state.

If not, the bill is footed entirely by the employer.

"Our greatest challenge is numbers," said Morsani.

"If there are only four or five students then the price is higher.

But if you've got 10 or more we can do almost anything you want."

Most classes are short term, such as a two-day class offered on Microsoft Project, a project management application or even afternoon classes on what Morsani calls "soft skills" such as coaching team members and how to delegate.WNCC also offers a series of such classes that runs for 14 weeks, like a regular college course.

Morsani said his initial focus has been on marketing to manufacturing companies, which are interested in a wide range of classes, from welding to Microsoft's Access database program to Spanish for supervisors.

Starbucks, the coffee maker with a roasting plant in Minden, for example, has gone through WNCC to provide some soft skill classes and is now working with the college to develop a maintenance curriculum, including welding, machines tools and electronics, for its plant workers.

Other industries show promise, too.

"We haven't tapped casinos or service industries like real estate, which require continuing education hours," he said.

"There is huge potential in healthcare if we can meet their needs."

The department's work can also be a tool for economic development.

A big issue for most companies looking to relocate, said Morsani, is a competent and capable workforce.

"Companies are looking for trainable, not necessarily trained, people," he said.

In the area of renewable energy, for example, an industry that Carson City is working hard to attract, the college has classes on geographic information systems.

"The college will be instrumental in assisting with that," Morsani said.

"I'm not personally involved right now, but if education is remotely an issue for a company looking here we want to be involved."