A Health Sciences Centre will be built at Okanagan College in Kelowna. Representatives from the provincial government and Okanagan College are pictured in this image from Twitter at a media conference to make the announcement, Tuesday, March 21, 2017.
Image Credit: TWITTER/Okanagan College
March 21, 2017 - 11:05 AM
KELOWNA - A new Health Sciences Centre is being built at Okanagan College in Kelowna with the help of provincial tax dollars.
The province announced a $15.4 million contribution to the construction project this morning, March 21, at a media conference. The total cost of the Health Sciences Centre is $18.9 million with the College covering the balance.
“This new building will be the missing piece of the puzzle when it comes to training our health care and social development practitioners of the future,” Okanagan College student Jenny Winberg says in a B.C. Government media release. “The addition of a modern building with state-of-the-art equipment will set students up for even greater success in their education and they will be better prepared to head out into the workforce.”
The 2,800 square metre Health Sciences Centre will be built next to the current Laboratory Building. An additional 79 health and social development student spaces will be created as a result of the building.
The new integrated learning centre will include practical nursing, pharmacy technician, early childhood education and human service worker programs.
“The new building will be constructed to meet high standards of sustainability and will provide a modern learning space for students who will become an integral part of our province’s work force,” Okanagan College president Jim Hamilton says in the release.
The project will create 71 construction jobs and 47 positions in supplier industries, according to the release.
Construction of the project is set to begin in the summer of 2018, will be finished by early 2020 and ready for student by the spring of that year.
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News from © iNFOnews, 2017