WyoTech celebrates 90,000 square feet expansion

LARAMIE - WyoTech, a Laramie technical school, is helping to meet a national need. 

That was the sentiment expressed by school, community and business supporters who attended the ribbon-cutting ceremony last Saturday for a 90,000 square feet, $16 million training center on the WyoTech campus. 

The private school in West Laramie opened its doors to the public with a ribbon cutting and campus tours. 

Though gathered in a shop surrounded by cars, trucks and the equipment needed to repair and upgrade them, the focus of the comments by school and community speakers was not about the equipment, but the students and teachers who use them. 

For many of the speakers and attendees at the event, preparing skilled workers in trades is a high priority, not only in Wyoming, but across the country. 

"Employers love our students," WyoTech President Jim Mathis said. "We have two customers to serve, our students and the employers who hire them. Again, it's our students and their ability to get jobs that makes us successful. Their success is our success." 

Brad Enzi, president and CEO of the Laramie Chamber Business Alliance, spoke about ways that the school creates a "constant generation of workforce."

He said that WyoTech's story is one that reaches into many facets of the community and extends nationwide. 

"Its an important story, but possible because of the weaving back and forth with you, the members of the community. It's the story of the kid that will get a ride on a private jet because that's how valuable these kids are," Enzi said. 

"It's the story of the worker shortages that we are seeing around the country. And it's the vital role that this plays. You talk about the trucker shortage, and how we don't have the people drive the goods, but if we don't have the kids from this school graduating with the education that they have, they don't have anyone to service those trucks and the truckers don't have anything to drive," Enzi said. 

"So when you talk about the supply chain, it starts in rooms like this around the country with people who are passionate about what they're doing and the role they play in keeping America moving," he said. 

One of the employers attending was Kyle True, owner of Roadmasters Auto and Tire Center, a business with four locations in Denver. 

True said he depends on WyoTech for skilled workers. 

"We need these students," he said, emphasizing the need for more students interested in entering trades. "This is Wyoming solving a national need by putting competent people out there to keep this country going." 

Jamin Woody, who owns McCandless Truck Center in Aurora, Colorado, also said that he looks to WyoTech for employees. 

"I'm excited about it. I don't spend any time at any voc tech but here. It's a far better program, friendlier," he said. "I've hired from all the voc techs but this is the best." 

The new building is named the Dave Kuhn Training Facility, in honor of the WyoTech facilities director who oversaw the project, Mathis said. 

"He literally worked seven days a week to accomplish this," Mathis said. 

He added that the contractors were Wyoming-based, primarily from the Laramie area. 

WyoTech is an accredited for-profit technical college founded in Laramie in 1966. 

Jim Mathis, WyoTech president, bought the school in 2018 after it faced the possibility of closure. 

"We started with 12 employees four years ago; currently we have 190 employees," Mathis told the crowd of nearly 200. 

WyoTech provides training programs that prepare students for careers as technicians in the automotive and diesel industry with nine-month training programs that focus on hands-on experience. 

The new building includes eight new classrooms, each for a capacity of 44 students. 

Most of the building will be committed to shop space, allowing students to get hands-on training across its six specialty programs, including Street Rod, High-Performance Power Trains, Applied Service Management, Chassis Fabrication, Advanced Diesel and Trim and Upholstery, according to WyoTech. 

The new facility will allow WyoTech to increase its enrollment by 400 students, increasing its capacity to 1,200 students. 

A new construction project for student housing is being planned.