By Eric Althoff
SALT LAKE CITY鈥擜 state-of-the-art technical education facility is now open as part of Salt Lake Community College. The new Westpointe Workforce Training & Education Center (WWTEC) will train students for business and industrial careers. The WWTEC, which aims to address a technical skills deficit in Utah鈥檚 STEM fields, is located in the industrial Northwest Quadrant, an area of the capital city that has been heretofore underserved in the area of higher education.
Under one roof, the WWTEC will feature classrooms for instruction in specialized technical areas such as welding, plastics, diesel technology and CDL truck driving instruction.
SRG Partnership, which is based in Portland and Seattle, designed the 121,000-square-foot building as a 鈥渇lexible鈥� modern space for education. Learning features include laboratories and 鈥渟hop spaces鈥� that are meant to mimic real-world work environments that students might one day encounter in the field.
In a statement to 91视频, SRG said that replicating real-world environments at the school will also give some of the students a leg up when it comes to applying for jobs in their fields.
鈥淲ith 46% of SLCC鈥檚 students taking career and technical education courses, the Westpointe Workforce Education and Training Center is making a huge impact to close the gap for the need of skilled workers for Utah鈥檚 economic development and ensure long-term vitality of the community,鈥� the statement noted.
The building鈥檚 interiors feature high ceilings, a marriage between indoor and outdoor space and ample natural daylight for interior spaces. Furthermore, social areas have been specifically set aside to promote interactions between students and between students and staff. A solar roof also aims to neutralize the building鈥檚 carbon footprint entirely.
SRG said that the site of the WWTEC has a fault line running through it, as well as a below-ground high-pressure gas line鈥攂oth of which had to be considered as the construction went along.
鈥淭his limited the area of building footprint available and led to the elongated form鈥� of the building, the statement said. 鈥淭he magnitude of its scale and volume at over 600 [feet] long was a challenge. The design team was sensitive to addressing the human scale by breaking up the mass through form and materials.鈥�
Furthermore, the designer ensured that learning spaces themselves would face away from busy I-215 nearby.
鈥淭his allowed for the academic areas and entrances to be [at] pedestrian scale while the machine and industrial scale of the building was parallel to the freeway,鈥� the statement said. 鈥淭he building placement also provided an opportunity for SLCC branding and advertising on the east fa莽ade facing the freeway to help draw attention and interest.鈥�
SRG鈥檚 partners on the $43 million project鈥攐f which $33 million went to construction alone鈥攊ncluded architect of record ajc architects and general contractor Big-D Construction, both of which are located in Salt Lake City.