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BCCC and Philadelphia Building Trades Announce Historic New Partnership
Pre-Apprenticeship Program To Provide Students with Path To Union Membership Officials of Bucks County Community College (BCCC) and the Philadelphia Building & Construction Trades Council today announced the launch of the “Bucks County Community College Building & Construction Trades Pre-Apprenticeship Program”, which is believed to be the first of its kind in Pennsylvania. The 11-week course offers BCCC students the opportunity to study many skilled Building Trades disciplines.
Skilled building and construction workers are in high demand. To help fill the need, BCCC has partnered with local Building Trades unions to offer its students free training and career service assistance. The launch of this new program is funded through a PA Department of Labor and Industry PAsmart grant. Participants will learn from industry experts with extensive experience in their fields at the state-of-the-art Center for Advanced Technologies (CAT) on the Gene and Marlene Epstein Campus at Lower Bucks in Bristol, PA.
The 11-week, 288-hour curricula will provide the fundamental education necessary for graduates to apply for a Registered Apprenticeship Program (RAP) to potentially secure a high-paying, family-sustaining job. Additionally, students will earn OSHA-10 and Aerial Platform Lift Safety certificates.
“The Philadelphia Building and Construction Trades Council is ecstatic to be partnering with Bucks County Community College on this unprecedented new Pre-Apprenticeship Program,” said Building Trades Business Manager Ryan N. Boyer. “This innovative program, taught by our experienced Trades’ instructors, will provide students who are interested in a career in the unionized construction trades with industry-specific knowledge and a significant edge on other apprentice training program applicants.”
“Bucks County Community College is proud to join forces with the Philadelphia Building and Construction Trades Council in this historic partnership,” said Dr. Felicia L. Ganther, President of Bucks County Community College. “Bucks is committed to providing students with pathways to meaningful and relevant career opportunities, and this collaboration furthers that commitment. We are thrilled to welcome our first cohort of students to this inaugural program!”
Joining Boyer and Dr. Ganther on the dais were BCCC Board Chair Tom Jennings and Associate Vice President Tracy Timby.
For many young people, a traditional four-year college degree is not a viable option, for various reasons. The Philadelphia Building & Construction Trades Council Apprenticeship programs provide young people with the opportunity to “earn while they learn”, along with entry into family-sustaining careers in the unionized construction industry, upon graduation. This unique Pre-Apprenticeship Program being offered by BCCC and the Trades offers participants a potential gateway into a highly-coveted Philadelphia Building Trades Apprenticeship Training Program.
The inaugural cohort of the BCCC Pre-Apprenticeship Program begins April 10, 2023 and will feature a total of eight students. With the current staff of seven Building Trades instructors, the BCCC Pre-Apprenticeship Program can accommodate as many as 32 students over the next two years under current grant funding.
For more information, contact Program Manager Christine Harvie at christine.harvie@bucks.edu.
Code Number Safe [Un]Safe Exhibition At Hicks Art Center Gallery
Hicks Art Center Gallery at Bucks County Community College is pleased to present a group exhibition of new and historic art works featuring U.S. and internationally based artists. Code Number Safe [Un]Safe will be on view from Wednesday, January 18 through Saturday, March 4, 2023.
The group exhibition will feature sculpture, painting, drawing, collage, assemblage, photography, and video works by:
Miriam Carpenter, Paul W. Evans, Helen Rebekah Garber, Hand Drawn Map Association (Kris Harzinski), Daniel Healey, Edward Ellis Hughes (Courtesy of The Petrucci Family Foundation), Barbara Martin, Kathleen McSherry, Neal Pressley, Lorna Simpson (Courtesy of The Petrucci Family Foundation), and Steina and Woody Vasulka (Courtesy of Electronic Arts Intermix).
The premise of the exhibition "Code Number Safe [Un]Safe" is built around the concept of numbers and numeric systems holding values for safety and stability or on the contrary- impermanence and oppression. The cohort of artists participating in the exhibition use numbers and numeric identifiers to describe personal, process and historical narratives through sculpture, painting, collage, or visual diagrams/images that symbolize spaces for realized well-being or vessels of conflict.
Artistic expression is often codified solely as a right-brain endeavor. However, many artists utilize left- brain processes, organically, out of preference or necessity, by sourcing a multitude of numeric systems to augment right-brain creative activities; in artworks deploying painting, printmaking, photography, video, assemblage, and sculpture in the exhibition “Code Number Safe [Un]Safe.” For example, Lorna Simpson’s photogravure and screen-print work, “Counting” employs various means of quantifying time, history, architecture, and the body(hair) with texts flanking three images while Barbara Martin’s expressionist paintings include repetitive marks or tallies to measure rhythm in dance. Enumeration for Paul W. Evans is made visible by tackling familial relationships through sibling birth order. In addition, Evans paints and collages numbers juxtaposed with plant shapes to question the proliferation and detrimental side effects of genetically modified organisms to humans and the environment.
Neal Pressley’s “No. 7” series of woodblock prints capture a historic building’s past identification before it was erased during the site’s development into a construction company’s Lancaster headquarters. An augmented reality video will illustrate where the “No. 7” was originally seen on the building prior to its transformation. Daniel Healey’s Letraset transfer drawings are shape forms the artist meticulously creates by hand, “not [with] a computer, or lensing an AI response.” Steina and Woody Vasulka on the other hand, embraced new medias and broke technological barriers to create moving images that questioned the presence of the human hand in artmaking. Their two works in the exhibition, “1-2-3-4” and “Solo for 3” look archaic now and almost humorous in their basicness. But at the time of their making, the videos were groundbreaking.
From the Hand Drawn Map Association’s archive, founder Kris Harzinski is exhibiting a selection of maps with subjects ranging from concepts of partnership to transit line numbers in a fictional city. While numbers do not appear visually on Miriam Carpenter’s exquisitely carved wood feathers, the title of the first one the artist created is the average number of feathers of a mallard duck, 11,903. Each subsequent sculpture’s numeric title is one less than the one made before it. In “Code Number Safe [Un]Safe, Carpenter will exhibit the 15th feather, “11,889.” Experiencing the daily ritual of self-injection as a means of healing and survival, Kathleen McSherry felt guided to make the sculpture “MS Nightmare” from found objects in her collection that spoke to her in a transformative and meaningful way that words cannot describe. In Edward Ellis Hughes’ remarkable collaged painting from 1982 the numeric references are not obvious which raises questions that may remain unanswered; “Did the artist choose the numbers randomly and do they signify some thing or being?”
Although numbers are attached to specific values like money and hurricane categories, the artists in “Code Number Safe [Un]Safe” made conscious decisions to include them in their artworks as clues to explain the inherent values personally significant to them and others.
Exhibition programming is free and open to the public and includes:
February 2, 2023, 2 p.m. - Helen Rebekah Garber will present an Artist Talk in the Zlock Performing Arts Center at Bucks County Community College. Garber will speak about her journey as a nurse practitioner and artist and how they intersect on her canvases through numerical patterns. Following the Artist Talk, the exhibition’s opening reception will be held in the Hicks Art Center from 4-6 p.m.
February 7, 2023, 10-11:30 a.m. - Kris Harzinski, artist, director, and founder of The Hand Drawn Map Association will present a map making workshop in the Hicks Art Center room H100. Materials and supplies will be provided.
Gallery hours throughout the exhibition will be Monday – Friday, 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. and Saturdays noon to 4 p.m.
About the Hicks Gallery
Hicks Art Center Gallery at Bucks County Community College provides a varied series of curated art exhibitions and related programming in support of the Arts & Communication Department and as an important educational and cultural resource for the community. The Gallery is located at 275 Swamp Road, Newtown, PA 18940 in the Hicks Art Center on the Newtown campus of Bucks County Community College.
The Esteé Lauder Companies Donates to BCCC to Advance Supply Chain Education
ELC donation will fund scholarships for the next generation of diverse talent near ELC’s manufacturing and distribution operations in Bristol, PA The Estée Lauder Companies (ELC) is proud to donate $200,000 to Bucks County Community College, a public community college located nearby ELC’s long-held manufacturing and distribution operations in Bristol, PA. This donation, which marks the largest single corporate investment the college has received in its 60-year history, will help advance supply chain education and employment opportunities for students in the local community and lay the foundation for a comprehensive, multi-year career readiness program.
“As one of the world’s largest manufacturers and distributers of prestige beauty products, The Estée Lauder Companies is committed to investing in the supply chain talent of the future,” said Roberto Canevari, Executive Vice President, Global Supply Chain, The Estée Lauder Companies. “We are thrilled to offer Bucks County Community College students an opportunity to advance their education and be exposed to the vast career opportunities available in supply chain.”
This donation is expected to fund scholarships for local students with expressed interest in supply chain to complete their two-year Associates degree at Bucks County Community College on-campus or online. Students will obtain experiential learning opportunities at ELC’s Bristol, PA facilities to gain real-world insights into supply chain, manufacturing, and distribution operations. ELC leaders will also serve as mentors for these students.
“It is an honor to partner with The Estée Lauder Companies to unlock new academic and hands-on learning opportunities for our students,” said Dr. Felicia L. Ganther, President of Bucks County Community College (Bucks). “This career pathway program will provide support, funding and intentional engagements to propel students from their first college course to successful supply chain careers. It underscores the power of higher education and corporate collaborations to drive employment.”
This donation marks a critical step in laying the foundation for a broader, comprehensive educational and career readiness program in development between The Estée Lauder Companies, Bucks County Community College, and Temple University's Fox School of Business. This program will foster a new pathway that guides students through high school and college to pursue full-time careers in supply chain operations. Additional details on this unique program and the initial pilot group of students will be unveiled in spring 2023. For additional information on the Supply Chain Scholars program, please contact SupplyChainScholars@bucks.edu or visit the Supply Chain Scholars website bucks.edu/SupplyChainScholars.
The Estée Lauder Companies is one of the largest employers in Bucks County, PA with thousands of employees working across its manufacturing and distribution operations. Throughout its 33-year presence in the area, ELC has supported the Bucks County community through support to a range of local organizations.
“We are incredibly proud to further our philanthropic investments in the Bucks County community and build a pipeline of emerging talent who can help strengthen our local distribution and manufacturing operations,” said Ken Pickett, Vice President, NA Distribution, The Estée Lauder Companies. “We look forward to the powerful possibilities that this program will unlock for ELC and Bucks County Community College students.” On a global scale, ELC and ELC’s Charitable Foundation are committed to supporting education through partnerships with a range of non-profit organizations and academic institutions in the U.S. and around the world.
About Bucks County Community College
Founded in 1964, Bucks County Community College is a two-year, public institution located in Southeast Pennsylvania that offers more than 80 programs of study that lead to either an associate degree or certificate, as well as many noncredit certificate and workforce training programs. Classes are held online, and at campuses in Newtown, Pa., Bristol, Pa., and Perkasie, Pa. To learn more, visit bucks.edu.
About The Estée Lauder Companies Inc.
The Estée Lauder Companies Inc. is one of the world’s leading manufacturers, marketers, and sellers of quality skin care, makeup, fragrance, and hair care products. The company’s products are sold in approximately 150 countries and territories under brand names including: Estée Lauder, Aramis, Clinique, Lab Series, Origins, M·A·C, La Mer, Bobbi Brown, Aveda, Jo Malone London, Bumble and bumble, Darphin Paris, TOM FORD BEAUTY, Smashbox, AERIN Beauty, Le Labo, Editions de Parfums Frédéric Malle, GLAMGLOW, KILIAN PARIS, Too Faced, Dr.Jart+, and the DECIEM family of brands, including The Ordinary and NIOD.
