Federal Money Goes Toward Drilling Training At Butler County School

Scott Detrow

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Scott Detrow is a congressional correspondent for NPR. He also co-hosts the NPR Politics Podcast.

Detrow joined NPR in 2015 to cover the presidential election. He focused on the Republican side of the 2016 race, spending time on the campaign trail with Donald Trump, and also reported on the election's technology and data angles.

Detrow worked as a statehouse reporter for member stations WITF in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, and KQED in San Francisco, California. He has also covered energy policy for NPR's StateImpact project, where his reports on Pennsylvania's hydraulic fracturing boom won a DuPont-Columbia and national Edward R. Murrow Award in 2013.

February 16, 2012 | 11:09 AM

A Western Pennsylvania school is training students for drilling-related jobs. As the Post-Gazette reports, Butler County Community College is funding the effort with federal grant money:

Butler County Community College is using more than $1 million in federal grant money to link the area’s displaced workers with jobs in the booming Marcellus Shale industry. The first class started last week.
“The goal is to develop rapid deployment of laid off and underemployed workers into high-wage, high-demand jobs. It’s exciting to be part of an effort like this,” said Karen Zapp, who was hired Jan. 4 as the program manager for TACT, an acronym for the Transition Adjustment Assistance Community College Career Training. BCCC will receive $553,044 in federal money to use over three federal fiscal years, from October 2011 through September 2014. Additionally, another pot of federal money for “emerging industry” job retention from the U.S. Department of Labor will allow the college to receive $3,000 in tuition reimbursement for each person trained.
The community college identified the gas and oil industry as “the new big thing” for the region. A three-week class for roustabouts to work on gas and oil drilling rigs began Feb. 6 with 17 students.