GLENDALE : Training Center Has Home After 77 Years

After 77 years of teaching in trailers, bungalows and borrowed classrooms, Glendale Community College’s Adult Community Training Center finally has a home to call its own.

The center’s new 20,000-square-foot building at 1122 E. Garfield Ave. will be dedicated Friday in a ceremony attended by Rep. Carlos Moorhead (R-Glendale).

Moorhead is scheduled to give center administrators an American flag that once flew over the Capitol.

The $2.5-million facility, which administrators and support staff moved into April 18, will allow adult educators to better teach 12,000 Glendale residents who use the center’s resources each year, said Lani DeVincentis, GCC dean of non-credit adult education.

Larger classrooms and computer labs in the new facility give teachers more room for equipment that was difficult to operate in temporary facilities, occupied by the center’s classes since the adult education program began in 1917, DeVincentis said.

Students ranging in age from 17 to 90 visit the center each year for schooling in English as a Second Language, business skills and training in basic reading, writing and math. The program also offers classes to prepare students to take tests for their General Equivalency Diploma.

More than $1.6 million in state grant money helped administrators purchase the Garfield Avenue property, while funds from the Glendale Community College chancellor’s office were used to build the facility. The center is operated as part of the college’s non-credit program.