Schools Merge to Avoid Losing Programs

Raritan Valley Community College and Bridgewater's Technology Institute are joining forces, with the aim of continuing to provide strong offerings for their students.

In a new effort to save funds and avoid cutting programs, the Somerset County Vocational and Technical Institute and RVCC have teamed up to offer adult classes at the Bridgewater campus.

Now called RVCC at Bridgewater, the site will offer technical programs, as well as specialties geared specifically for adult students, like professional and personal development.

Until the decision was made for the change that will go into affect this fall, the adult Technology Institute at the vocational school offered higher education courses for those who had earned their high school diplomas. Classes were offered in such fields as nursing, construction management and automobile mechanics.

But despite the offerings, there were problems with the arrangement.

"Tuition was very low to make it affordable, and you can't run a business that way," said Vocational and Technical Institute Superintendent Michael Maddaluna. "It became problematic, and there were problems with leadership. The school didn't have what it needed."

After a while, Maddaluna said, new leadership came into the school, but even that wasn't enough to save the programs when the economic crisis began.

"We hoped we could put in good programming, then the economy fell out," he said. "We knew this wasn't going anywhere, so we did what we could in 2008 and 2009 to downsize."

From there, Maddaluna said, the Somerset County Board of Chosen Freeholders approached the school with a recommendation.

"They said why don't you share the school [with the college]," he said. "And we said, it sounds like a good idea, but it took us a year to plan."

In June 2009, an Exploratory Study Committee was put together to look into the feasibility of the consolidation of the two schools. According to Janet Thompson, executive director of marketing for RVCC, the committee found that the consolidation would improve the quality of programs, yield cost savings and could at least defer future capital construction.

"The community-based committee was put together to study that feasibility," said Janet Perantoni, dean of continuing education for RVCC. "It made sense for post-secondary work to be run by the college. Administrative costs were reduced, and the day-to-day management remains at the college."

Perantoni said there have always been joint programs between the vocational school and RVCC, including interior design and others.

"So the mechanisms were already in place," she said. "We are linking the academic programs."

What this change meant, Maddaluna said, was that the property of the Technology Institute—the name given to the part of the school that offers classes only for adults—would be leased out to the college, which will be running all classes on its own.

The college officially began its administrative duties of all post-secondary programs on July 1.

"We lease the space to the college, and we have an arrangement like a landlord and tenant," Maddaluna said of the about 39,000-square-foot building. "But all the programs are coming from the college. The college has full administrative duties."

Maddaluna said he believes this move is actually in the best interest of the college and the students.

"I think the college will be able to expand," he said. "They're in the business to teach adults, and we're not. This will benefit the citizens and help people get jobs."

Maddaluna said some high school classes will still be run from those buildings only because they would not have enough space otherwise. But other than those few, he said, the college will be running all courses in what used to be the vocational school's Technology Institute.

Among the vocational and technical programs being offered by the college at the Technology Institute's location are heating and air conditioning, automotive technology, interior design, cosmetology, auto body repair, welding and computer networking.

Perantoni said anyone with a high school degree will be able to take classes in the new RVCC programs at the Bridgewater campus.

"But a lot of courses will attract the younger crowd, like automotive technology," she said. "And we are embracing all vocational training."

At this point, Perantoni said, there are no plans to make changes to the programs already offered by the Technology Institute, but the college will be investigating them. She said all areas will be looked at individually over the next few years.

"No changes will be made yet," she said. "For the fall, we had to do programs for the continuation of spring programs. And we are giving two to four years to look at the programs and see what needs to be done."

Perantoni said she is very pleased with the facilities offered at the Technology Institute. In previous years, the coursework between the institute and RVCC was a partnership, sharing programs and feeding into each other.

Now, she said, RVCC is running them.

"We will look for every which way to offer the programs," she said.

Information about credit programs is already available, and information on non-credit courses will be released next week.