Mar 14 - McClatchy-Tribune Regional News - Tesa Culli Mt. Vernon Register-News, Ill.

Rend Lake College has been awarded $1.6 million from the U.S. Department of Labor under the President's Community-Based Job Training Grants Initiative. The grant award was confirmed around noon Thursday, according to RLC President Mark Kern.

"It's an energy-based grant, which will allow us to educate 420 participants in three years as coal-mine welders or production miners," Kern explained.

Rend Lake was one of 69 community colleges and community-based institutions across the United States which competed for a total of $125 million in grant funds. There were 341 applications received in Washington, D.C., according to the Department of Labor.

Last year, RLC started its mining technology curriculum after a several-year hiatus.

"In the late '70s, we had 64 full-time staff, and 17 of them were engaged in training coal miners," Kern recalled. "In just a few years, we couldn't place a student, after just two years earlier having 100 percent placement."

With the rise of new mine projects in the region, including the Peabody Energy Campus which will have two mines near Pinckneyville, two mine projects in the Franklin and Williamson counties areas and the Power Holdings, Inc., project in Jefferson County, the college decided to bring its mining technology program back.

"We project that in the next three to five years, coal mines will be coming back to the area," Kern said. "Maybe not as big as before, but we want to have a trained workforce ready."

Kern said part of the funds from the grant will be used to partner with five area high schools to offer dual-credit courses in mining and to work with 15 area grade schools to raise awareness of mining careers.

"We've lost a generation of coal miners," Kern explained. "We're going to have to rekindle that interest."

The Community-Based Job Training Grants were announced in 2004 by President George Bush in his State of the Union address. The grants were to improve the ability of community colleges to provide their regions' workers with the skills needed to enter growing industries. The first round of competitive awards was made on Oct. 19, 2005, and the second round of 72 awards were made on Dec. 11, 2006, according to the Department of Labor.

Kern said the grant money is expected to be received by the college by April 1.