United States Senator John Cornyn will visit Austin Community College’s Health Sciences Facility on Saturday, February 21, 2004 at 2:15, 3401 Webberville Road. The Senator will tour ACC’s state-of-the-industry Dental Hygiene and Nursing Labs. After the interactive tour, the Senator will join ACC interim president Steve Kinslow in a press conference.

Senator Cornyn is extremely supportive of the large number of professional partnerships existing between ACC and the Central Texas business community. “Austin Community College has key partnerships with the area health care community and plays an important role in helping young people become well prepared for good jobs when they enter the workforce,” said Senator Cornyn.

Seton Healthcare Network and St. David’s HealthCare Partnership are two of the major industry partners in the Health Sciences Program. “My visit to ACC will give me the opportunity to see first hand how ACC is training students in Central Texas with valuable skills especially in the health care professions.”

In addition to the health care partnerships, ACC’s semi conductor program has relationships with numerous high tech industry leaders such as Sematech, Samsung, Applied Materials and Motorola.

The College’s Automation, Robotics and Controls program works with Dell, 3M, Abbott Labs and National Instruments. The College also has numerous partnerships through our Workforce/Continuing Education Programs with Cisco Systems, Microsoft Corp., Austin Institute of Real Estate and Austin Independent School District among many, many others.

President Bush, in the State of the Union Address, acknowledged the importance of partnerships like the ones ACC has developed. The President’s Budget builds on this potential by strengthening the role of community colleges in workforce development, providing $250 million for a new, employer-focused grant program for training in community and technical colleges. To receive funding, qualified applicants would be required to prepare a training plan with community colleges and employers, and certify that training would focus on industries with demonstrated labor shortages, such as health care and advanced manufacturing.