A committee to determine programming and design for the new career and technical center building is in the process of being formed.
Executive Director of Career and Technical Education Ryan Merritt said plans are to meet by the end of the month and include about 27 people.
Financed by Proposition 1 of the Nov. 7 bond, the site location is off Murphy Street with nearest cross street of South Meadow. Gifted by Grow Odessa, the site is 37.9 acres and valued at $2.8 million.
Proposition 1 was for $424,263,000. The whole bond was for $436,109,000.
Merritt said the center will be home for 400 high school students with 2,000 students transported every day for CTE programs.
It will be a joint-use facility with Odessa College and a world-class faculty that could be the model for educational workforce development.
The proposition also includes a $7.5 million renovation of the ag farm.
On a connected topic, Merritt said there will be an eighth-grade career fair Jan. 30 at the Odessa College Sports Center.
Parents and all other students can attend from 4 p.m. to 7 p.m.
The board heard of policy changes brought on by the legislature that runs the gamut from facility standards, safety and security breaches and employment practices among other things.
Another policy change is that any child that fails the STAAR will have to have an accelerated plan in place with summer learning and transferring to another campus with a teacher incentive allotment teacher are two options.
It used to cover grades 3, 5 and 8 and now it’s all grades. The policy gives parents the right to make that request.
During public comment, Brian Stubbs, owner of Air Compressor Solutions, talked about his firm’s partnership with ECISD career placement initiative, a collaboration with the Workforce Board of the Permian Basin and ACCESS.
Brizzia Guzman, an ECISD student who joined the company after high school, also was recognized. She was promoted to lead welder at Air Compressor after six months.
Staci Zavala, from the talent acquisition team at Midland Memorial Hospital, also spoke positively about the partnership with the career placement initiative.
