BENTONVILLE, Ark. — The NorthWest Arkansas Community College's Trails and Trades Division said four miles of bike trails are built in the Northwest Arkansas area every week. With so much development, a well-trained workforce is needed.
The school was awarded a multi-million dollar grant last year toward the continued development of students looking to enter the trail building and maintenance industry through the NWACC's Trail Technician Program.
"This new program is the first of its kind," Trails Trade Program director Megan Bolinder said.
Bolinder said the new program will make huge strides in the development of trail technicians in the Northwest Arkansas area.
"It will be world class," she said. "It will have the best of the best equipment. It will have an ideal learning space for students to not only view on the screen what they're seeing their instructor do, but also have the materials or the equipment in front of them so that they can work on it as well."
Northwest Arkansas is widely known for its bike trails. With so much construction to build new tracks every week, Bolinder said it's important that the workforce is receiving quality training.
"By the time they're done with that program, they know the equivalent ... what technicians who've been working for seven years know," Bolinder said.
The Walton Family Charitable Support Foundation awarded the community college $8 million to renovate a 10,000-square-foot warehouse.
When it's done, it will have space for welding, woodworking, engine repair, a world-class lab, and classrooms for hands-on training.
"These are going to be the students who are out in the field, out directing projects in the field, out serving our land managers and our state parks and our local industry," Bolinder said. "And they are going to hopefully be the well-trained workforce that assists all of this development in the area."
NWACC will be hosting a group of trail industry leaders from Europe in April to align the curriculum for the program and discuss innovation.
The facility will be completed June 1 and students can enroll in the program for the fall 2024 semester.
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