By Valerie Fields Hill
Texas Metro News
Camryn Prevost was visibly excited at last week’s grand opening of Dallas College’s new Workforce Center at RedBird.
The elation showed on his face. Prevost, an electrical engineer who works at Walmart’s distribution centers in southern Dallas County, smiled, shook hands and offered friendly banter to more than 100 guests who walked through the 53,000-square-foot new training facility.
Prevost has reason for joy: Walmart’s recruitment of next generation forklift drivers and futuristic pallet operators – just became easier.
Walmart is among several major national companies that will directly benefit from Dallas College’s new Workforce Center at RedBird: The Center will train workers and grant them certificates in robotic technology, allied health, automation, logistics, mechatronics, and other high-demand fields. Upon completion of their training, the students will be ready for immediate hire at Walmart, Texas Instruments, and a litany of other major employers.
“One thing Dallas College will provide (to Walmart) is technicians,” Prevost said late Friday during the Workforce Center’s grand opening.
He said the Workforce Center offers Walmart a “pipeline” of highly skilled workers.
“Rather than having to go out and look… and solicit…that workforce is here,” he said.
Walmart may have struck gold with its Dallas College partnership.
Earlier this year, the big-box retailer announced it would use automation at its global distribution centers throughout the nation to most quickly and efficiently manage inventory and distribute canned goods and other items that are ordered online.
However, Walmart will need hundreds of workers who are skilled at operating robots at the company’s fulfillment centers, including its two centers in Lancaster. It operates a third fulfillment center in DeSoto, but that one is not fully automated, Prevost said.
Walmart’s Lancaster facilities include an e-commerce fulfillment center and a grocery fulfillment center. Both became fully automated it uses mostly robots to fulfill orders – earlier this year.
At its corporate announcement last spring, Walmart executives said the retailer is banking its economic growth on these fulfillment centers; but Walmart struggles to find workers who have the training to operate its new robotic forklift equipment and pallet loaders, among other automated jobs, Prevost said.
As a result, Walmart has been forced to switch gears in its recruitment strategies.
“Walmart is learning how to hire,” said Prevost, who recently transferred with the company from Bentonville, Ark. “You don’t need a degree for some of these positions.”
Dallas College administrators couldn’t agree more: They say their new Workforce Center fills a needed training gap between higher education institutions and workforce needs in Dallas and surrounding counties.
Further, administrators say, the Workforce Center bridges a broader gap between the city’s higher income earners and its lower-wage workers who live in Dallas County’s southern sector.
According to college leaders, 18 percent – nearly one in five – residents who live in South Dallas do not have a high school diploma. Many such residents want high-demand jobs and living wage careers, administrators said, but lack sufficient training or required skills that employers expect.
As a result, such workers often are left on the outskirts of the workforce and, ultimately, in a cycle of poverty.
It’s that challenge, Dallas College administrators said, that they seek to tackle.
“One of Dallas College’s strategic priorities is to impact in- come disparity throughout our community,” said Gloria Smith, Dallas College’s vice provost of workforce education, in a news release about the opening of the new Workforce Center.
“…The center will allow us and our partners to provide educational opportunities that lead to high demand jobs for a population that has been historically underserved,” she said.
The new training facility occupies the former Dillard’s re- tail store at The Shops at RedBird. It officially opened Dec. 8.
The Workforce Center will train up to 10,000 students annually when it becomes fully operational. Faculty will train students in information technology, allied healthcare fields, manufacturing, logistics and other technology-related areas.
The Center will offer high school equivalency courses, English as a Second Language, financial literacy and career readiness. Students may access career coaches alongside social services, including housing and food support, mental health, transportation and childcare services, according to the news release.
“We know that the education- al landscape has become increasingly competitive, and it is our responsibility to ensure our students and community have the knowledge and resources necessary to succeed,” Dallas College Chancellor Justin Lo-non said in the release.
Dallas city leaders lauded the opening of the new Workforce Center.
“This is just great synergy and a highlight of what can be done if we work together,” said Dallas City Manager T.C. Broadnax. The city invested about $25 million to redo infrastructure around The Shops at RedBird to accommodate, among other entities, the new Workforce Center at RedBird.
Prevost said, Walmart has the ability to capably train its own workforce, but doing so would be time-consuming – and costly.
“It’s the efficiency,” he said. New employees who earn automated forklift certifications and other motorized equipment licenses at the Workforce Center before applying to Walmart “are ready to start now. The retailer, ultimately is spared the expense of on-site training and lengthy workplace probationary periods.
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