September 19, 2016
Contact: Kate Brock, Secretary of the Board of Trustees, Rural Regional College of Northern Pennsylvania/Executive Director, Community Education Center of Elk/Cameron Counties
P: 814-781-3437
Email: kate@communityedcenter.com
Region Awaits Opening of New Rural Regional Community College
Residents within the region will soon have access to affordable and accessible education, including open admissions/enrollment/entrance policies (i.e. no criteria beyond a high school diploma/GED®), low tuition and, the ability to participate in or near a person’s home community.
The Rural Regional College of Northern Pennsylvania (RRC) is an initiative to bring a new community college to a nine county area in northcentral and northwestern Pennsylvania. The new college will serve residents of Cameron, Crawford, Elk, Erie, Forest, McKean, Potter, Venango and Warren Counties.
The 7,000 square miles the college is charged with serving has presented a unique opportunity for the Board to develop innovative delivery methods utilizing existing capacity and infrastructure throughout the region. “Every community from Erie to Emporium will be able to access a community college education through this new institution,” says former state senator and Chair for the RRC Board of Trustees, Mary Jo White.
The planning of the college has included collecting and analyzing demographic, socio-economic and labor market data and information about the 9-county region, distributing surveys to businesses, community members, and high school students, and conducting and inventory the region's current secondary and post-secondary educational facilities. Academic and technical offerings, administrative organization and locations, accreditation plans, and other policies will also be identified as part of this plan. Nearly 3,500 community members, businesses and students completed surveys to help determine the educational needs and aspirations throughout the region. A summary of the results can be found at www.communityedcenter.com/rrcnorthernpa.
Appointed by the PA Department of Education in December 2014, the RRC Board of Trustees will be submitting its operating and financial plan to the Department within the next several months. The Board will soon launch the search for the college’s first president.
For more information about the RRC initiative, please visit www.communityedcenter.com/rrcnorthernpa, or contact Duane Vicini, the RRC Project Manager at dvicini@ecuapa.org or 814-757-5731.
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Image attached: RRC.PAmap – the nine-county region which will be se