IN 2018 a satellite campus of the Tennessee College of Applied Technology (TCAT) opened in the Coffee County Interstate Industrial Park. Recently, the campus was moved to a building on Volunteer Parkway allowing the industrial maintenance training program to expand, as well as potentially adding a nursing program. All of this is good, but the county has bigger plans.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI want our next generation to be living right here, working with good jobs right here in the county,\u201d Coffee County Mayor Gary Cordell said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Long term, the county wants to have their own TCAT campus, which would allow them to offer more classes. For that reason, the County Commission has agreed to designate 12 acres in the Coffee County Joint Industrial Park for the\u00a0construction of a permanent facility. Cordell said having a permanent campus would bring economic benefits to the county, because interested businesses will know there are well-trained people in the area.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Many students are able to get involved with TCAT with the help of Tennessee Promise, which provides high school graduates the opportunity to attend a community or technical college, tuition free.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWhen they come out with their certificate, they\u2019ll come out\u2026 with their fees paid, and they\u2019ll come out debt free, unlike in a lot of colleges,\u201d Cordell said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The TCAT McMinnville campus is also exploring dual credit options in Coffee County. Coffee County Career and Technical Education (CTE) director, Richard Skipper, said that part of that will be a retooling of the welding program to get students certifications earlier.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe have such a wide opening of opportunities,\u201d Skipper said. \u201cThe only thing that we know for a fact is that our kids are going to be something. We don\u2019t know what that is, because they don\u2019t know what that is right now. Some of them do, and we have the tracks in place to do that, but we\u2019re really focused on giving our kids as many opportunities in as many areas as they can.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cCurrently, the state of Tennessee has approved 16 different CTE focus areas. Coffee County Central High School (CCCHS) provides 24 programs of study in 15 of those areas, only skipping government because it has a lot of overlap with their already strong law program,\u201d Skipper said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThe CCCHS CTE program pushes work-based learning, because there are many lessons that can be learned \u2013 and sometimes the best way to do that is get students involved in the field. Sometimes students find something they love, and some find out they hate something. Both are valuable lessons,\u201d Skipper said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI\u2019m more focused on working backwards and giving you enough of a taste to figure out what you really need to do to be the most successful in what you like to do,\u201d Skipper said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Both the CTE programs and TCAT help prepare students for their future and encourage businesses to come to Coffee County. Cordell said that he wants the students to have jobs waiting for them when they are ready.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe\u2019re looking forward to the future and what a TCAT partnership will mean to Coffee County and helping pave the way for the next generation of our students,\u201d Cordell said. -GN <\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" IN 2018 a satellite campus of the Tennessee College of Applied Technology (TCAT) opened in the Coffee County Interstate Industrial Park. Recently, the campus was moved to a building on Volunteer Parkway allowing the industrial maintenance training program to expand, as well as potentially adding a nursing program. All of this is good, but the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":19,"featured_media":68,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13419","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-stories"],"yoast_head":"\n