Region is benefiting from student pipeline

Having two career and technical education centers for Lewis-Clark State College and Lewiston High School right next to each other in the Lewiston Orchards is one of the ways the two programs are closely linked.

Students enrolled in programs at the high school’s DeAtley Career Technical Center often head over to take college courses at LCSC’s Schweitzer Career and Technical Education Center.

Some students start even before they’ve graduated from LHS. That’s the case for Cole Lockart, an LHS sophomore. He is taking an industrial electronics dual-credit course at the Schweitzer Center. He’s using the course to work toward his eventual degree in electrical engineering.

He worked with robotics when he was younger, then began taking a class with Terri Varnado, who teaches robotics, tech and engine design at the high school, and learned about the dual-credit course.

Lockart said at the high school he learns more of the foundations of industrial electronics, and the college work is more advanced.

“College is fairly hands-on,” he said. “High school is more textbook-based and a little bit more instruction from the teacher. College is like, ‘Here, do this, if you need help, ask me.’ ”

The course also makes him familiar with both the DeAtley and Schweitzer centers and the equipment in both. He said having the two buildings together makes it easy to walk to classes.

Kerby Cole, who graduated from LHS in 2021, has moved from the DeAtley Center to the Schweitzer Center, working in the engineering technology program. After he graduates, he is hoping to get a job as a draftsman or engineering tech at a firm.

He took a machining class with Pat Schmidt at LHS and became interested in solid draft work.

He decided to attend LCSC because it was local and for financial reasons. He had also taken classes at the Schweitzer Center, so he quickly became familiar with the facility.

At LCSC, he is drafting auto cabs, which uses more mechanical engineering, an industry he enjoys. Although some aspects of the class are similar to what he learned at the DeAtley Center, he has more independence over his learning.

“It’s very self-paced, so if you’re able to finish it in a day, you can finish it in a day,” he said.

The two schools were linked through their programs even before the new high school was built. Josiah Boots, of Boise, graduated from LHS in 2019. He got his associates degree and certification at LCSC for welding. He now travels around southern Idaho as a pipe welder and pipe fitter for Cascade Enterprises.

While there was no welding class at LHS, Boots took machining and spent time in that class learning some basics. He didn’t enjoy the machining aspect but became interested in welding.

“It was just something I was good at and it came to me easily. I thought that it would be a good way to go make a living,” he said. “The experience I had at the high school was one of the things that influenced me to take the job as a welder’s apprentice.”

As a welder’s apprentice, he got a job repairing heavy equipment. At LHS, he talked with the school counselors to help plan his career path to welding and learned of the program at LCSC.

“It was kinda one of those things where the high school gave me a little bit of a taste of what the welding entailed, and at the college you learn fully how to weld,” he said. “High school is important to get the experience there to give you an idea of what you want to do.”

At LCSC, students started out with flat-plate welding, a skill that is considered easier to learn. The program then progresses to more advanced work, like the pipe welding Boots does for his job.

“If I just did the things I did in high school, but not at LCSC, I don’t know if I would be doing what I’m doing today,” Boots said. “The program is a really good program. It has a good reputation and it was getting better every month while I was there.”

Jeff Ober, dean of LCSC’s career technical division, said that although the COVID-19 pandemic subdued the opening of the Schweitzer Center, the opportunities at the center are growing.

Ober said the college is hoping to expand dual-credit courses, like industrial electronics, to more programs and more students in the region.

LCSC career and technical programs serve the same region 2 area as the DeAtley Center, which includes schools from Grangeville to Kamiah and Kooskia to Moscow and Potlatch.

“We’re really doing the same thing, trying to reach all the students and make things available in region 2,” Ober said. “There are challenges and it’s a large geographic area.”

One of the ways LCSC is reaching out to those students is going to high schools and letting them know about the offerings at the college. The dual-credit course is another way, because students who live farther away can take courses and do most of the work remotely. Then students travel to the Schweitzer Center one day a week for the two-hour lab.

“We’re doing lots of things like that to draw (students) in, not just at the DeAtley but in the region, to get them here and see what we have to offer them,” Ober said.

Having the two buildings so close to each other was intentional to foster the relationship between high school and college learning.

“The reason for that location was so we could have that connection and be right there and get students to go back and forth,” Ober said. Instructors can also go from building to building if they need advice.

The back-and-forth creates an environment where students from LHS and LCSC can interact with each other. As a result, the auto clubs at the two schools began meeting. The two separate clubs now operate as one big club, Ober said.

Programs at the Schweitzer Center include auto mechanics technology, CNC machining technology, information technology, engineering technology, industrial electronics technology, industrial maintenance and millwright technology, and heating, ventilation, air conditioning and refrigeration technology. The welding program is located at the main campus at LCSC.

The partnership with LCSC has led to some enrollment increases for the college. However, Ober said there’s only been one LHS graduation since the two centers opened, so time will tell how it affects enrollment. Although he said the HVAC program has seen a few students start through dual-credit classes and then decide to earn their degree at LCSC.

Those are the partnerships that will continue to grow and expand as students can “literally walk down the street at the end of the school day and into our labs,” Ober said.

Brewster may be contacted at kbrewster@lmtribune.com or at (208) 848-2297.