Mid-State Technical College will launch a new hospitality management program this fall. The program will be offered in full at the Wisconsin Rapids campus, with many courses also available online or at the Mid-State locations in Adams, Marshfield and Stevens Point. The associate of applied science degree prepares students for a management career in the hospitality industry, including food and lodging facilities as well as a variety of other settings such as conference centers and sports and entertainment facilities.

Blackhawk Technical College and UW-Whitewater’s College of Business and Economics have formed a partnership that will help Blackhawk Tech business students transfer more easily to UW-Whitewater. The partnership between the two colleges has been in the works for several years.

Although it’s been open for a month, Northeast Wisconsin Technical College officially cut the ribbon on its new Learning and Innovation Center in Sister Bay. The Learning and Innovation Center features classrooms and meeting rooms for a wide array of offered courses in addition to a food processing kitchen. Residents are encouraged to check out the facility to use its services and take any community education courses that they have available.

Western Technical College and Viterbo University will combine their resources to create a bachelor’s degree in engineering under a new agreement. Beginning this fall, Western students will be able to pursue the “engineering pathway,” a 64-credit associate of science-liberal arts degree. All 64 credits will be transferable to Viterbo, where pathway students can enroll as juniors.

High school students are taking to the road in Eau Claire as part of a new Chippewa Valley Technical College program aimed at filling a truck driver shortage. The program allows 18-year-old high school seniors in their spring semester take the truck driving course to get their Class A commercial driving license. There are two programs being offered; one is during the day and is a ten-week course and the other is a night program that runs16-weeks.

Seventeen students from Bradley Tech High School in Menomonee Falls are competing for six openings in Harley’s youth apprenticeship in tool-and-die making, machine repair/maintenance and electrical maintenance. The students can take classes that give them credits at Milwaukee Area Technical College.

Waukesha County Technical College and Mount Mary University and now offer a joint 1-2-1 Nursing Program to tackle Wisconsin's nursing shortage. The nursing student's first year will be at Mount Mary University. Their next two years are spent at WCTC. The student's final year is back at Mount Mary where they'll earn a Bachelor of Science in Nursing degree.

Gateway Technical College has received a federal grant to train and certify 3,000 Certified Nursing Assistants statewide who will be targeted for work at long-term care facilities. The WisCaregiver Career Program will cover the training, textbooks, vaccinations, background checks, scrubs and certification exams for the first 2,000 successful applicants through the Wisconsin Technical College System. Another 1,000 students will receive funding for training and testing through state-approved nursing home nurse aide training programs.

Lakeshore Technical College has received a gift of $25,000 from Kaysun Corporation of Manitowoc to provide scholarship support for LTC students — $15,000 of which will be designated to support the LTC Promising Futures Scholarship Campaign with the remainder going toward the Kaysun Corporation Manufacturing Scholarship.