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Lethbridge College seeking feedback on educational needs in Taber

Feb 17, 2019 | 7:45 AM

TABER, AB – Lethbridge College wants to know what Taber’s educational needs are.

The Town expressed interest in Lethbridge College re-establishing a presence in Taber late last summer, according to the school’s Director of External Relations and Community Engagement, Sandra Dufresne.

“Historically, the college has had a presence in Taber, but we haven’t in many years,” she said.

Dufresne added that the town is hoping to meet some its labour market needs and training deficiencies its experiencing.

“I met with them (Taber officials) a few times last fall and spoke with them about our mandate in regional stewardship and what we could do to start uncovering what a presence for us could be like in Taber,” she said.

“The model that Lethbridge College has for regional stewardship is each community has a community advisory council, so we’ve established that, and our next step forward is to really assess what the needs are in Taber and (the surrounding) area.”

To find out what those needs are, Lethbridge College has launched an educational needs survey.

“We’ll look at those results of anyone who’s 18 years of age and older to take a look at where their thoughts are, what their training needs are, where they think their own gaps are and what they find are barriers to pursuing post-secondary education,” she said.

Once the results are in, the college will look at the data with its community advisory council and create a path forward from there. 

“There’s lots of opportunity to provide training in our continuing education portfolio, just some general interest courses that people may be interested in,” Dufresne said.

“The presence will also help us establish the availability of our programs that can be done totally online. People who are unable to come to Lethbridge to take (classes) can complete credentials from our college without leaving Taber.”

Dufresne said that one day in the future, Lethbridge College could expand and build a campus in Taber.

Currently, the school has campuses in Pincher Creek, Claresholm, Vulcan and in Lethbridge.

The educational needs survey is open until March 8, 2019 and can be completed at this link.