Deputy Secretary of Department of Commerce Visits Olive-Harvey College
U.S. Department of Commerce Deputy Secretary Don Graves visited Olive-Harvey College. Photo by Tia Carol Jones.
On Friday, July 22nd, U.S. Department of Commerce Deputy Secretary Don Graves visited Olive-Harvey College and participated in a roundtable discussion about workforce development.
Olive-Harvey College is a sub-awardee of the Economic Development Administration’s Good Jobs Challenge to Chicago Cook Workforce Partnership (The Partnership). The Good Jobs Challenge is a $500 million investment in local workforce development, funded by President Joe Biden’s American Rescue Plan. Chicago Cook Workforce Partnership was one of 32 recipients. It received $18.5 million in funding.
Through Good Jobs Chicago, Olive-Harvey College will lead a transportation, distribution, and logistics sector partnership. “The biggest opportunity here is that we’re expanding jobs and opportunities for a population of folks who typically wouldn’t have been afforded this opportunity,” said Olive-Harvey College President Dr. Kimberly Hollingsworth.
Dr. Hollingsworth said Olive-Harvey College was willing to volunteer as the site for the roundtable because given the quality of the College’s program and services, it would be an ideal situation. “Our transportation and logistics program is highly respected with our partners, and I think that had a lot to do with it. We’ve been able to leverage those partnerships and relationships to ensure that our curriculum is current and relevant. I think we were just poised and ready to take on the challenge,” Hollingsworth said, adding that Olive-Harvey is excited about the partnership and the opportunity to expand existing programming.
Part of that expansion includes CDL A B and C, which have waitlists, and branching into electric vehicle repairs. Jaime Martinez is a technical trades automotive instructor at Rivian. At Olive-Harvey College, Martinez is one of the instructors that is teaching electric vehicle repairs. The program with Rivian began at the College on May 15th. Since then, the students have learned how to safely work on the high voltage system, remove battery packs, remove drive units, done interior teardowns, remove and replace components, as well as how to do service maintenance.
“Students get that real world exposure. I want to make sure when students graduate here, they hit the floor running. We are giving them the ability to relocate anywhere,” Martinez said. “We help with that relocation, as well. I think that’s it’s very important that in order to launch your career, that we help them and give them that push that they sometimes need.”
Graves said the Department of Commerce is trying to identify partners in communities across the country where using the funds from the American Rescue Plan will be an investment that is amplified and create gamechanging training and development for those communities.
“We’re putting out hundreds of millions of dollars with this program and we can’t do it on our own. We don’t know the factors that are going on in an individual community. It’s more important to understand what the communities are seeing, what they’re dealing with, what the historic challenges of underinvestment, disinvestment and the pathways to the opportunities that are coming,” Graves said.
Graves added, because Olive-Harvey College was already working with The Partnership, it made sense to leverage the work that was already going on at the College, and the rest of the City Colleges of Chicago, as well as with the Partnership.
“This investment is going to supercharge what is already happening here. The thousands of people who are anxious to get into the jobs that are here and that are coming but haven’t had the pathway,” Graves said. “That’s what this is all about. The Good Jobs Challenge is about creating stronger pathways, helping people to identify those jobs that are going to be good paying, they’re going to be able to sustain their family on the job and to have the type of training that leads to lifelong learning.”
For more information about Olive-Harvey College, visit www.ccc.edu/colleges/olive-harvey.
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