General Information

Go behind the scenes in a CAC virtual tour

“I have the opportunity to tour lots of people through the Community Arts Center and it’s always kind of a pleasure for me to help them understand the history, how this particular operation fits into the community and what we feel are important contributions,” says William J. Martin, co-chair of the facility’s board of directors. He shares that perspective during a 16-minute walk-through on YouTube, pointing out the building’s unique architecture and many of the decorative flourishes brought back to life during the extensive restoration that preceded its grand return in 1993. The historic CAC, at 220 W. Fourth St. in downtown Williamsport, is a wholly owned subsidiary of Penn College.

General Information

Board approves training site, property purchase, contract with auditing firm

The Pennsylvania College of Technology Board of Directors on Thursday approved the National Sustainable Structures Center opening a building performance training site in Westmoreland County, authorized the purchase of a property on First Street and ratified a contract for auditing services.

To satisfy COVID-19 restrictions, the virtual meeting featured remote participation from board members, college administrators and members of the news media.

General Information NSSC Workforce Development

College to offer building performance training in western PA

Pennsylvania College of Technology’s National Sustainable Structures Center is adding a training site in Westmoreland County to enhance delivery of building science and energy efficiency training for the U.S. Department of Energy’s Weatherization Assistance Program.

The Penn College Board of Directors approved the site Thursday. The leased 7,500-square-foot facility, located at 321 Cherry Hill Drive in Latrobe, will enable the NSSC to offer the same services provided in Williamsport. NSSC is contracted by the state Department of Community and Economic Development to provide building performance certification training and testing.

General Information

ESC faculty/staff tend to projects in students’ absence

While online instruction continues across Penn College’s varied and distinctive majors, faculty and staff at the Schneebeli Earth Science Center are keeping up with laboratory work in anticipation of students’ physical return.

Automated Manufacturing & Machining Faculty & Staff General Information Industrial, Computing & Engineering Technologies STEM Students

WNEP shares educator’s industrious crisis response

A faculty member’s contribution to the COVID-19 fight, using the same 3D printing technology through which he teaches students in his manufacturing labs, was featured on Newswatch 16’s Monday broadcasts. WNEP journalist Nikki Krize remotely interviewed Eric K. Albert, an associate professor of automated manufacturing and machining, about his extracurricular fabrication of face shields and ventilator splitters. “When we’re in a situation like we are now where we need to produce custom parts and maybe lots of different things, additive manufacturing is one of the technologies that helps,” Albert says in the story, which premiered at 5 p.m. “It’s not fast, but it’s very flexible.”

Automated Manufacturing & Machining Faculty & Staff General Information Industrial, Computing & Engineering Technologies STEM Students

Penn College professor manufactures ventilator splitters

Eric K. Albert, associate professor of automated manufacturing at Pennsylvania College of Technology, holds three of the eight vent splitters he made with his home 3D printer in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Albert followed directions provided by ventsplitter.org to manufacture the splitters, which are awaiting emergency FDA approval. As a last resort, the vent splitter allows multiple patients to share one ventilator.

As the developer of Pennsylvania College of Technology’s additive manufacturing curriculum, Eric K. Albert has preached to his students for years about the ingenuity facilitated by 3D printing. A few months from retirement, he’s proving his point by responding to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The associate professor of automated manufacturing and machining has used his own materials and 3D printer to produce eight non-FDA approved ventilator splitters made of ABS, a widely used engineering resin, that could – in a worst-case scenario – allow a facility to connect more than one patient to a ventilator.

Alumni Corporate Relations Faculty & Staff General Information Students

Penn College gives thanks

The future of Pennsylvania College of Technology students is made by hand and by the support of many. The generosity of loyal employees, alumni, corporate partners, retirees and other friends benefits students in numerous ways. From scholarships to global experiences to intercollegiate athletics, such assistance makes life-changing opportunities possible for the college’s “tomorrow makers.” Join narrator Zachary J. Kravitz, a construction management major; nursing students Jillian C. Hiestand and Harlee G. Brooks; Tiffany Brown, enrolled in applied health studies: occupational therapy assistant concentration; welding and fabrication engineering technology major Nathaniel H. Lyon; and Stevie A. Petrison, a 2019 graduate in business administration: sport and event management concentration, as they say, “Thanks!”

Faculty & Staff General Information Sciences, Humanities & Visual Communications

Additional campus donation bolsters health care arsenal

Geisinger Radiology's Jessica K. Kemock dons one of the face shields to be fashioned from college-donated transparency sheets. (Photo provided) — Geisinger Radiology’s Jessica K. Kemock dons one of the face shields to be fashioned from college-donated transparency sheets. (Photo provided)

Answering the program director’s cry on social media for transparency film, familiar to anyone who uses or remembers overhead projectors, a faculty member in the School of Sciences, Humanities & Visual Communications spearheaded the roundup of hundreds of additional sheets for donation to Geisinger Radiology.

The film can be used to make face shields for front-line health care providers.

“They had run out of material and weren’t able to order a supply in a timely manner,” noted Sarah S. Moore, instructor of human services and restorative justice. She reached out to Joanna K. Flynn, dean of curriculum and instruction, and Michael J. Reed, vice president for academic affairs/provost.

Faculty & Staff General Information Students

Newsletters bridge social divide between CLC staff, children

As Penn College faculty find unique ways to teach their students remotely, teachers in the college’s Dunham Children’s Learning Center are keeping their young charges engaged from a distance, too.

“Each day, the teachers are sending an email to families with a suggested activity,” explained Barbara J. Albert, director of the children’s learning center. “The families are sending back photos of the children. The teachers then create a ‘newsletter’ which is shared with the families.”

Construction & Design Technologies Faculty & Staff General Information Industrial, Computing & Engineering Technologies NSSC Nursing & Health Sciences Transportation & Natural Resources Technologies

College pitches in to protect COVID-19 front line

Donated equipment awaits delivery to health care providers.

Pennsylvania College of Technology is aiding the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic by donating personal protection equipment to area health care facilities.

Various departments have spent the past week collecting supplies – originally intended for on-campus student and staff use – to be distributed within the next few days to the college’s nursing home partners.

General Information

Campus Bloodmobile moved to downtown hotel

The American Red Cross blood drive scheduled for April 8-9 at Penn College has been moved to The Genetti Hotel, 200 W. Fourth St., Williamsport. If those dates are not convenient, other drives are scheduled in the surrounding area. The Red Cross has a critical need for blood product donations as uncertainties remain during the coronavirus pandemic. Blood drives continue to be canceled at an alarming rate, and patients need a sufficient blood supply throughout the many weeks of this crisis and beyond. Healthy individuals are needed to schedule an appointment and donate in the days and weeks ahead to help patients who need lifesaving blood. Appointments are encouraged and can be made by logging onto the Red Cross website.

General Information Industrial, Computing & Engineering Technologies Welding

Welding Digest spotlights college’s enhanced lab

An article and YouTube video about Penn College’s expanded welding lab in the Lycoming Engines Metal Trades Center have been added to the Welding Digest website. The American Welding Society’s premier digital news source, the site is designed to provide thousands of welders and allied professionals with news and information related to the welding/fabrication industry.

Admissions Faculty & Staff General Information Students

Open House canceled; additional Exploration Days planned

Spring Open House, scheduled for Saturday, March 28, has been canceled, as are general Tuesday/Thursday campus tours through the remainder of the spring semester.

Additional Exploration Days have been scheduled for May 29; June 27; July 8, 15 and 25; and Aug. 10. (The Exploration Day scheduled for April 24 has been canceled.)

General Information

Gallery at Penn College closed

As of March 16, The Gallery at Penn College is closed until further notice. Gallery staff is committed to continuing to provide a safe, healthy environment for employees and visitors. The current exhibit, “Victory for a Dime: The Fighting Comic Books of the Second World War,” is available on the gallery’s Facebook page.

Faculty & Staff General Information Students

Spring Break extended as precaution

Pennsylvania College of Technology has no reported or confirmed cases of COVID-19. Out of an abundance of caution, the college has extended Spring Break for students by one week, until Monday, March 23.

Students should remain at their permanent residences during this time. There will be no academic-related activities for students on or off campus.

Faculty should plan to report during the week of March 16 at times designated by their academic school dean. For more detailed information, students, faculty and staff should refer to email communications issued March 11 by the college president, provost and vice president for student affairs.

Updates on postponement/cancellation of campus events will follow as the information becomes available.

Please continue to refer to the college’s Coronavirus COVID-19 web page for the latest updates.

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