MUHLENBERG EVENING COLLEGE GAINS GRANTS FOR CORPORATE PARTNERSHIPS PROGRAM
Muhlenberg College has been approved to carry out two grant initiatives from the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania Department of Community and Economic Development. The grants are for training and development through the College's Corporate Partnership Program.Wednesday, April 24, 2002 03:48 PM
Muhlenberg College has been approved to carry out two grant initiatives from the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania Department of Community and Economic Development. The grants are for training and development through the College's Corporate Partnership Program.
The customized job training grants were awarded to SunGard Pentamation Inc. and Northampton Generating Company, who have partnered with Muhlenberg College. The SunGard Pentamation grant is for $150,000, while the Northampton Generating grant is for $125,000.
"More and more businesses are coming to Pennsylvania to invent the future, and we're making sure they have qualified workers to do the job," says Pennsylvania Community and Economic Development Secretary Sam McCullough. "Thanks to our Customized Job Training grants, and the successful partnerships formed with Muhlenberg College, SunGard Pentamation and Northampton Generating Company, Pennsylvania will have employees that are better equipped to succeed in the new economy, and better equipped to handle the biggest job of all - inventing the future in Pennsylvania."
Located in Bethlehem, SunGard Pentamation is a national leader in providing high quality administrative software products, systems solutions and support services to school districts and local governments.
Northampton Generating Company, located in Northampton, is an independent co-generation facility designed to produce enough energy to supply approximately 110,000 homes, while also supplying process steam to a local paper recycyling plant. "We work hand-in-hand with these companies, starting with writing the grant proposals, right through the final training sessions," says Nancy Gratz, Associate Dean of Muhlenberg's Evening College and director of the Corporate Partnerships Program. "We assess the company's training needs and develop individual, customized programs to meet those needs."
Gratz notes that "in some cases, we have expertise on our faculty to design and provide the training. In other cases, training is provided by outside experts. Our goal is to improve company competitiveness by enhancing employees' skills through training.."
"This is a chance for us to increase our advanced, new technology training for our staff," says Keith Geingrich, Vice President at SunGard Pentamation. "We look forward to partnering with Muhlenberg College. They understand our needs and are working with us to provide excellent training for our 300 employees."
The College has a number of other corporate partnership training and development grants being processed by the Commonwealth.
In addition, Corporate Partnerships at Muhlenberg College is working with several area companies conducting on-site training. Customized programs were recently provided for Hatfield Quality Meats, HYDAC Technology Corporation and PPL Corporation.
