Southeast College is marking their 40th anniversary this year. Already, there have been some special events to mark the anniversary of the College.
“We undertook a corporate rebrand that updated our logo, slogan, and colors. We also dropped the ‘regional’ from our name this past year in order to better reflect the contribution we make to educating and training for the entire province,” said Sheena Onrait, manager of Marketing and Communications for the Southeast College.
“The themes of the newly updated look embody energy and movement and represents the responsiveness and flexibility of Southeast College,” said Onrait.
The College is planning a 40th anniversary celebration with their staff at their annual College conference this December in Weyburn.
The College has adapted to the needs of the many southeast communities that it services over the past 40 years, by adjusting their programming, locations and services.
“The mission of Southeast College is to provide access to learning experiences and information that enable people and communities to meet the realities of today and create opportunities for tomorrow,” said Onrait.
“Today, we are very focused on aligning our programming with labour market needs.
“By doing so, the College can help ensure continued economic growth and success of businesses and industry in southeast Saskatchewan.
“We also plan to employ more technology in our program delivery in order to increase learner access to post-secondary opportunities,” said Onrait.
The main success for the Southeast College is that they are able to create opportunities that provide learners with the opportunity to learn where they live.
“This in turn, creates opportunity for our stakeholders to employ and retain our graduates here at home in southeast Saskatchewan.
“We continue to be an industry leader in training for Saskatchewan’s energy sector providing opportunities for employers to train their staff locally.”
“Of course, along with our energy sector fluctuations have come some challenges for the College,” said Onrait.
“Those challenges include finding affordable housing for our students in those peak times, and keeping our course offerings timely and affordable during low times.”
The Southeast College chooses courses using a number of factors, but foremost in their decision is the utilization of local labour market data.
“We believe that by using this data to select our training programs, we best prepare our students for success because they are trained in careers with a strong local labour demand,” said Onrait.
“This also supports our partners in industry, as we invite them into our classrooms to meet our students and create strong career connections,” said Onrait.
“We are proactively engaging with business to support programs that will produce a potential future employee for them.”
“For our learners, this is a great way to chart a career path knowing that the employment prospects are positive,” said Onrait. “At the same time, we are working to deliver training targeted at existing employees to help them enhance their skills.”
“These types of programs will help increase productivity for businesses and provide new career options for their employees.
There are many great opportunities on the horizon for the Southeast College, with the completion of their Weyburn campus, as well as new opportunities for programming with Saskatchewan Polytechnic, the reintroduction of university-level programming, continuing the evolution of leadership and business training, and program refreshes for key industry training programs, just to name a few.
“We truly believe that Southeast College is fueling the future,” said Onrait.
