PHOTOS BY BILL RITENOUR
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Pathways to Progress will remove the financial barrier for folks to receive the schooling necessary to help Brunswick County to continue to grow.
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North Brunswick Magazine
Builders Association and co-founder of the Woodsong Scholarship for Construction Careers through BCC Foundation. The neighborhood of Woodsong originally created its annual arts event, Woodsong Porch and Art Stroll, in conjunction with Sunset River Marketplace artists to showcase the community, but the event quickly morphed into a fundraising effort. With the close of the fifth event in April 2019, the community had exceeded $40,000 raised for trades education and support. Now potential students need to step up and accept the grant funds. “I’m excited about the grant and Pathways to Progress because it meets an immediate need we have in Brunswick County,” says Dr. Gene Smith, president of BCC. “We are one of the fastest-growing counties in the nation, requiring infrastructure and homes and people to provide those places and repair those places in which people reside.” Smith says that since moving here in January, he has heard in every corner of the county the need for skilled
employees in all of the trades of construction technology. “Pathways to Progress will remove the financial barrier for folks to receive the schooling necessary to help Brunswick County to continue to grow,” he says. Smith emphasizes that the program is for anyone who is interested in getting a good job in a reasonably short period of time and to any business whose employees need additional skills training. It is important, he says, for students in middle school and high school to begin thinking of this as a possible career path and for the adult population to understand the opportunities that exist in these various fields. “As people gain the skill sets in these areas, there are great possibilities in entrepreneurship to start their own successful business,” Smith says.
Want to join the Pathways to Progress? Inquiries about the Pathways to Progress construction workforce program and partnership opportunities at Brunswick Community College can contact: Onya Gardner, dean of continuing education/workforce development, at (910) 755-7490 Greg Bland, vice president of continuing education/workforce development, at (910) 755-7374 For more information about Brunswick Community College go to brunswickcc.edu.