After years of planning, promoting, fundraising and fine-tuning, Lethbridge College’s new Trades and Technologies Renewal and Innovation Project received a huge boost from the Alberta government in December, which means work on the much-needed building can begin this spring.
The announcement was made on Dec. 6 at Lethbridge City Hall, when then-Deputy Premier and Minister of Enterprise and Advanced Education Thomas Lukaszuk announced $56 million in government support for the college project, which will include new learning spaces and equipment for an additional 880 students in eight trades and four technology programs. On the same day, the government also announced $200 million for the University of Lethbridge’s Destination Project.
For the college, this means that a bit of work remains raising the final funds for the facility, but plans are already in place to put a shovel in the ground this spring to start building. “The new trades and technologies facility will have the ability to support 2,300 learners,” said Randy Jespersen (Business Administration 1973), chairman of the college’s board of governors. “The partnership between the Government of Alberta, the college and our many community partners ensures we can continue to provide access to learning opportunities and applied research, while preparing highly skilled graduates in southern Alberta for employment in trades and technology-related fields.”
The college expects to see its first intake of students in this new facility in the fall of 2017. For more information about the TTRIP project, go to http://learn.lc/TTRIP.
On the day of the announcement, Lethbridge College’s President and CEO Dr. Paula Burns addressed the crowd at City Hall with words of thanks and enthusiasm for what the building – and the education that will take place there – will mean for the city, region and province. She said:
This really is a milestone day for post-secondary education in southern Alberta, and we’re so pleased to be here with our colleagues and friends from the University of Lethbridge. This city-wide support for these two essential projects illustrates the government of Alberta’s commitment to education, innovation and building a prosperous province filled with accomplished, well-trained, and well-educated citizens.
The new Trades and Technologies Renewal and Innovation Project, or TTRIP as we affectionately call it, will be a centre of excellence that fosters interdisciplinary innovation among students, instructors and industry partners. The education that will occur in this building will not only benefit our learners, but it will also be valued by their employers and the community as a whole. The students who learn here will go on to support the economic and social growth of our city, our region, and the province and country as well.
The building has been designed to enable further development of applied research and to prepare the highly skilled workers our province needs and with the flexibility to address emerging trends and changing needs that will face our region as time goes on. This facility will play an important role in achieving the new vision that Lethbridge College adopted earlier this year – when we made a commitment to leading and transforming education in Alberta. It will allow us to further nurture our collaborative partnerships with the community, with industry and with other secondary and post-secondary institutions. And it will provide even more opportunities for the college and our students as we embrace academic transformation.
