Construction of the Technical Innovation Center at PTC

Project Overview

Piedmont Technical College (PTC) is seeking $10 million from the 2024 Greenwood Capital Project Sales Tax. They intend to match this with various revenue sources, grants, PTC and state funding order to construct the estimated $22,015,521 state-of-the-art 31,000 square foot Technical Innovation Center on the campus of PTC in Greenwood.

Piedmont Technical College (PTC), in partnership with Greenwood School District 50, Ware Shoals School District 51, and Greenwood School District 52, proposes to build a state-of-the-art Technical Innovation Center (TIC). The TIC will house programs from the existing G. Frank Russell Technology Center, along with new, innovative PTC offerings like:

• Automotive and Electric Vehicle Technology
• Truck Driver Training
• Supply Chain Management
• Heavy Equipment Operation
• Logistics

The shared, flexible classrooms and laboratory spaces will facilitate opportunities for expanding the curricula and reach for both PTC and the school districts. By locating the TIC at the heart of PTC’s Greenwood campus, high school students will have access to not only the programs housed and offered by their current career center, but also to PTC’s renowned industrial technology, health care, business, and arts and sciences programs located on-campus, including access to the William H. “Billy” O’Dell Upstate Center for Manufacturing Excellence located next door.

Likewise, because of this collaboration, PTC will have the ability to offer programs not previously available to students, like Cosmetology and Culinary Arts.

The following career-oriented programs will be available to over 1,100 Greenwood County high school students annually at the TIC and/or through an accessible technical education partnership with PTC:

• Agriculture/Horticulture
• Automotive Collision
• Automotive Technology
• Building Construction
• Business Finance/ Accounting
• Cosmetology
• Culinary
• Health Science
• Project Lead the Way (Biomedical Science and Pre-Engineering)
• Programming/Software Development
• Sports Medicine

The facility will allow PTC to expand its popular Automotive Technology program to include new, in-demand curriculum options for the emerging field of Electric Vehicle Technology. Additionally, the expansion of our Truck Driver Training program will feature both classroom space and an on-site outdoor training pad. It will accommodate the 125 students who participate in our training programs annually and will expand our capacity to train additional students on our two-month waitlist, as well as students who are currently enrolling in truck driver training programs outside of our county and region due to a lack of program space and service capacity.

Finally, the Center will house Logistics, Supply Chain Management, and Heavy Equipment operations, all the first of their kind offered in our service area. These programs are being proposed in response to requests from area industry and county and city government for training and availability of these high-demand occupations.

The benefits of this Center will be immense. The 2016 Capital Project Sales Tax revenue helped to facilitate the construction of the William H. “Billy” O’Dell Upstate Center for Manufacturing Excellence (UCME). The UCME has provided space for industries such as Teijin and E.A. Sween to begin and expand their operations, which has subsequently helped these organizations create over 500 jobs and generate well over $600 million in investment into Greenwood County. The TIC will expound. upon this success and will build the foundation for our future business and industry leaders, preparing them for an equal, or likely even greater, impact on our community.