\n
Melissa Schuman \/ The Troy Record & Saratogian \/ June 4, 2022<\/p>\n
MALTA, N.Y. \u2014 Congressman Paul Tonko made a tour of several facilities to raise awareness and advocacy for his Community Funding Project which was recently submitted to the House Committee on Appropriations for federal funding contributions. Each one of the facilities visited is part of 15 that have been selected for the Project.<\/p>\n The Fiscal Year 2023 Community Funding Project aims to secure federal funding for sites around the Capital District, providing opportunities for growth and the continuation of community services. Tonko, D-Amsterdam, optimistically estimates that the Project will be on President Biden\u2019s desk for a signature by the end of the year.<\/p>\n The second stop on Tonko\u2019s tour was Hudson Valley Community College\u2019s (HVCC) Training and Education Center for Semiconductor Manufacturing and Alternative and Renewable Technologies, or TEC-SMART, located at the College\u2019s Matla campus, commonly referred to as HVCC North. The TEC-SMART lab is getting a major upgrade this summer, with a new two-story building equipped with labs and state-of-the-art classrooms being built adjacent to the current structure. The groundbreaking for the new building is on June 29.<\/p>\n \u201cThe purpose of this tour is to encourage public awareness, for you to record my voice and share it with others, which I hope will increase advocacy,\u201d Tonko said.<\/p>\n As part of Tonko\u2019s Community Funding Project, any money that is secured for HVCC North will go towards not only resources for the new TEC-SMART building, but also towards resources for the entire campus, allowing it to better serve more students.<\/p>\n \u201cWe are so thankful to you and your team to make this happen,\u201d Dr. Roger Ramsammy, president of HVCC, said to Tonko. \u201cWe believe the future of our Capital District is going to happen right here. This expansion will be a building that is state-of-the-art. You hear people talk about that, but when you are next door to Global Foundries, who is known worldwide for being the best in the industry, to say that we are state-of-the-art actually means something \u2013 we have that standard to live up to.\u201d<\/p>\n HVCC North is located adjacent to the Global Foundries FAB 8 facility and actively fosters a healthy working relationship with the industry giant. The programs taught on campus train students for the STEM workforce, and Global Foundries regularly hires TEC-SMART graduates.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ve got 3,000 employees right now and we want to add 1,000 more,\u201d commented Jordan Steller, a Global Foundries employee who also serves on the HVCC Foundation Board of Directors. \u201cA Project like this is a great opportunity. We\u2019ve currently got about 200 HVCC graduates working at Global Foundries, and I\u2019d like to see that number rapidly doubling and tripling.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThis is very, very essential,\u201d Tonko said of the funding he\u2019s advocating for the campus. \u201cWe need to focus on a human infrastructure. Today we\u2019re talking about something that will support that human infrastructure. You can invest in policies and ideas, but you need a pipeline of workers to support them. This new building will create more opportunities for enrollment, more people who will tether a path to a career in STEM.\u201d<\/p>\n Malta Town Supervisor Mark Hammon pledged ongoing support to HVCC North, noting that \u201cthings like this remind us there\u2019s still hope and plenty of good things left in our country. We\u2019re proud to have you here.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWe recognize the opportunities that HVCC North will bring to our residents,\u201d agreed Rich Harris, deputy county administrator for Saratoga County. \u201cI congratulate Dr. Ramsammy and his team and I thank Congressman Tonko for his fierce advocacy.\u201d<\/p>\n Ramsammy noted that the direction HVCC North is headed in, with such a strong focus on STEM careers, may not be the way things have always been \u2013 but that\u2019s a good thing, and with Tonko\u2019s support the focus can be even stronger.<\/p>\n \u201cTuli Kupferberg once said \u2018when patterns are broken, new worlds emerge,\u2019 and that is what we are doing today,\u201d Ramsammy said. \u201cWe\u2019re breaking grounds on something new. It\u2019s not the norm, but we believe it\u2019s the future.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Published:<\/strong>\u00a0Mon, 06 Jun 2022 12:10:46 +0000 by\u00a0d.gardner<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Editor’s note: U.S. Representative Paul Tonko visited TEC-SMART on June 3 to promote one of 15 Capital Region Projects…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2086,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[133],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18177","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-in-the-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/chronicle.hvcc.edu\/wpdev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18177","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/chronicle.hvcc.edu\/wpdev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/chronicle.hvcc.edu\/wpdev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chronicle.hvcc.edu\/wpdev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2086"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chronicle.hvcc.edu\/wpdev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18177"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/chronicle.hvcc.edu\/wpdev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18177\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/chronicle.hvcc.edu\/wpdev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18177"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chronicle.hvcc.edu\/wpdev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18177"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chronicle.hvcc.edu\/wpdev\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18177"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/chronicle.hvcc.edu\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/TonkoRamsammy-450x338.jpg\")
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/chronicle.hvcc.edu\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/GroupPhoto_Tonko.jpg\")