By early subsequent calendar year, Augusta Tech’s new automotive engineering campus will completely transform a former Walton Way motor vehicle dealership into a simulated mastering surroundings.
The college ceremonially accepted a $1 million donation for the task – at first introduced in April – from Columbia, S.C.-centered Jim Hudson Automotive Group, whose 10 dealership spots consist of 3 in Augusta.
“Anybody can promote a car,” firm founder and principal Jim Hudson reported in the showroom of his Lexus dealership on Washington Street. “It takes a seriously great technician to hold it bought.”
What was not disclosed in April was wherever the automotive technologies campus would be positioned. Augusta Tech a short while ago bought the former Johnson Motor Co., a Cadillac dealer that shut its place in 2021 at the edge of the city’s Laney-Walker neighborhood.
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Hudson’s $1 million, coupled with a separate $1 million donation from Augusta National Golf Club also announced in April, will fund substantially of the building and renovation expenses to entire the new campus by the end of the 12 months, Tech President Dr. Jermaine Whirl stated.
A developing task industry
The enlargement of Tech’s automotive application comes at a time when in-demand from customers maintenance workers are expected to have greater ability sets to conduct operate on ever more technologically-advanced cars. Electrical and hybrid autos will be amongst the emerging technologies analyzed in bigger depth at Tech.
About 69,000 openings for automotive provider professionals and mechanics are expected nationally every 12 months, on common, through the close of the 10 years, in accordance to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Stats.
Scheduling the new campus followed months of conversations with regional vehicle dealers, transit corporations and other industry stakeholders to gauge their curiosity in helping boost the auto-repair expertise pool in the Augusta spot, Whirl mentioned.
The software also will introduce “OEM,” or unique products producer coaching, so students can earn certifications to operate on specific will make and types of vehicles. Currently most OEM training is available only in other metropolitan areas or states, and there’s no guarantee that a worker who leaves Augusta to train will return to his Augusta job when training is total, according to Whirl.
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It can be not a new design
Turning vehicle dealerships into classroom space is new, but not unique. In 2019, Moore Tech in Memphis, Tenn., opened its auto technological know-how faculty in what employed to be a Honda dealership. Oklahoma’s Tulsa Technology Center opened a satellite campus in 2013 in an outdated dealership building, but the spot features non-automotive courses.
Placing Augusta-location college students in the expert habitat of a former motor vehicle dealership will add to yet another element of Tech’s new method, which will teach pupils on the enterprise side of the automotive field, for men and women who want to develop into product sales managers, finance supervisors or owners of car dealerships.
Tech’s bigger automobile campus will be in a position to accommodate far more automotive learners from its Augusta and Waynesboro campuses. Tech automotive teacher Taylor Bryant explained the method currently teaches 50-55 college students who jockey for do the job room in a person of the school’s 10 support bays in a 10,000-square-foot facility.
The new campus, measuring about 67,000 square ft, will have involving 35 and 40 service bays, he stated.
“It’s just one of the largest matters to materialize to our method in its record, and I can’t wait to see what we’ll be capable to do with community investments like this,” Bryant reported.