Ceremonies took place at South Texas College Aug. 1 to announce a $1 million Skills Development Fund from Texas Workforce Commission and DHR Health. The funds marked the 27th SDF grant for STC from TWC. It also marks the second grant in partnership with DHR.
The grant will provide customized training through a variety of healthcare areas. Additionally, it will benefit an estimate of 4,000 new and existing employees of DHR Health.
“In the healthcare industry, the whole business is changing every day,” said DHR Chief Academic Officer Dr. R. Armour Forse. “We have to talk about different ways for billing, coding, and documenting on top of treating new diseases even when there are days when our hospital is over 130 percent occupied.
“At the same time, we really want to bring our workforce up and give them all the new tools they need to move forward and take care of those patients,” Forse said. “How do we do this? Well it is through these grants, which we pursued with STC, which has been our educational partner because we want to be able to train these people while they’re in a job environment.”
STC was also awarded a Self Sufficiency Fund grant by Workforce Solutions. The $140,860 grant will train workers in high demand occupations. An estimate of 70 participants will participate from areas such as welding, phlebotomy and EKG technician. This is also the eighth SSF grant the college has received to date.
“The self-sufficiency grant targets people who are on the verge of becoming dependent on government assistance,” said Olivia De La Rosa, Director of Professional And Workforce Education at STC. “Through the grant we are going to train people who will hopefully learn a skill and get them a job on the path to self-sufficiency.”
About the Skills Development Fund grant
For more than two decades, the Skills Development Fund grant program has assisted employers with customized training needs. Through SDF in 2018, TWC awarded 50 Skills Development Fund grants totaling almost $24 million to 90 Texas businesses. It supported the creation of 4,682 new jobs while also upgrading the skills of 11,494 workers in existing jobs.