Pulaski County’s vocational training programs remain popular, but now the county’s having a hard time keeping up with demand. In recent years, the county has been able to set up an industrial repair and maintenance program at West Central High School, thanks to state grant funding.
But with the program’s popularity, the Community Development Commission now has to think about how to fund it long-term. “One of the teachers in the program is a full-time school teacher. The other one is an adjunct,” CDC Executive Director Nathan Origer told the county commissioners Monday. “Right now, the adjunct is only secured budget-wise through this school year, and between the demand for that program that we have seen that has really out-paced our expectations and the other workload that the full-time teacher has and the demand for a lot of his vocational classes, we’ve got a little bit of work to do, to make sure that we can keep the classrooms manned.”
Origer said that he’s been meeting with representatives from both West Central and Ivy Tech, to come up with ideas to strengthen the program.
