RVC-Tech-Bus-Ready-to-Deliver-Education-to-Your-Neighborhood.php

The RVC Tech Bus will make technology and IT based education and training more accessible and help narrow the digital divide in the Rockford region. The bus will visit schools, churches, local organizations, and community events, providing credit classes in mobile app development, and non-credit workshops like “Hour of Code,” “Girls Who Code,” and “Coding with Robots.”

The bus is a converted Rockford Mass Transit District (RMTD) city bus that was generously donated to the college by RMTD. Thanks to 24 charitable donors, the RVC Foundation raised $393,000 to help transform the bus into a fully-equipped mobile hub for cutting-edge technological training.

“The Tech Bus is another way RVC is working to provide accessible, exceptional educational and training opportunities to a diverse student body and community,” said RVC President Dr. Howard Spearman. “This has truly been a collaborative, community effort from people and donors who believe in the transformative power of education.”

“Early in the discussions about a RVC Tech Bus, I was an enthusiastic supporter,” said LoRayne Logan, RVC Foundation Board VP and Tech Bus Fundraising Committee Chair. “The bus is a great way to reach more residents and to be part of the movement to take education to people where they are.”

Classes began being taught on the Tech Bus on February 27 as seven students served by the RVC Workforce Equity Initiative (WEI) grant started the first week of a 12-week program to earn a mobile app development certificate. Classes and workshops that will be offered on the Tech Bus will be taught by Associate Professor of Computer Information Systems Chuck Konkol, a 20-year veteran faculty member at RVC.

“I am very excited to see this project launch in the Rockford region and look forward to the lives that will be positively impacted by the programs taught on the bus,” said Konkol. “It’s rewarding to see the vision we had back in 2017 finally become a reality.”