Durham Tech Receives $100,000 "PRESS For Completion" Grant

DURHAM - Durham Technical Community College recently won a $100,000 grant to help improve retention and ensure that students graduate with the credentials that will make them competitive in the job market.

 
Carver Weaver, who serves as director of marketing and communications for the school, says the money will be focused on helping the students who are most at risk for dropping out of school, especially African-American males.
 
“We will be adding some adjunct faculty that are specifically working with those students,” Weaver says. “We’ll be creating teams within the college to work on those issues.”
 
Durham Tech was one of 15 colleges in the country to win the grant, which came from the Walmart Foundation.  The grant is called “PRESS for Completion,” which stands for Persistence, Retention, and Student Success.
 
Weavers says the college’s ultimate goal is to help students graduate with the types of job skills they need to become employed in today’s economy.
 
“This will allow us to put more resources toward achieving those goals and improving our results,” Weaver says.
 
Durham Tech is also a leader in a network known as the “Achieving the Dream National Reform Network.” Durham Tech joined that program in 2005, and the college has already made great strides in improving first-to-second semester persistence and graduation rates.