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SBA administrators present $5 million workforce training grant to Iowa Valley Community College District at MCC Tuesday

By Robert Maharry 8 min read

About a month ago, the Iowa Valley Community College District (IVCCD), which serves Marshall, Tama, Hardin and Poweshiek counties and includes campuses in Marshalltown, Iowa Falls and Grinnell, was announced as one of just 11 community colleges in the entire country -- and the only one in Iowa -- to receive a $5 million grant from the Small Business Administration (SBA) aimed at strengthening small manufacturing capacity in critical industries. On Tuesday morning, SBA Great Plains and Great Lakes Regional Administrator Brad Zaun of West Des Moines and SBA Associate Administrator of Field Operations Lisa Shimkat of Fort Dodge visited the Marshalltown Community College (MCC) campus to formally present a check and meet with district leadership and area business owners about the grant and the future of automation in the workplace.

"IVCCD’s grant will fund hands-on, in-person training and technical assistance in robotics, automation, industrial software, advanced manufacturing, welding, machine tool competencies, and industrial maintenance for small manufacturers in Hardin, Marshall, Poweshiek, and Tama counties," a press release issued last month reads. "The program builds on training already delivered through Iowa Valley Business and Community Solutions (BCS) and draws on MCC's existing Advanced Manufacturing, welding, machine tool, and electromechanical instruction as well as the Ellsworth Community College welding program."

After introductions were completed inside Dejardin Hall, the group sat down for a roundtable discussion led by IVCCD President Anne Howsare Boyens, who noted that during a monthly meeting of the state's 15 community college presidents, the grant from the SBA was mentioned, and it was something she quickly began to pay close attention to after that.

Howsare Boyens explained that after she came to her current position in 2023, she hosted meetings with business leaders like Dustin Stowell of Colewell Automation in Montezuma and Joe Carter of MARSHALLTOWN Company, who were both in attendance Tuesday, about how IVCCD could assist in their workforce training and retention efforts. They both pointed toward needs in the fields of automation and robotics as part of a larger Career and Technical Education (CTE) curriculum.

"And I will have to say, without the support of our business and industry, (the grant) wouldn't have happened," she said, while also thanking members of the IVCCD board of directors. "When we can partner with business and industry, when we can partner with government, when we can partner with our community members, things like this happen, and I couldn't be more proud to be sitting here and thanking you both for allowing us this opportunity."

Shimkat then remarked that the grant applicants who rose to the top were the ones who thought beyond themselves and sought to benefit their communities and the businesses that support them as a whole.

"Business owners give more than just employment. They give the philanthropic side. They're there as a resource for the community colleges," she said. "I graduated from a community college, and it was the best decision I ever made."

She praised SBA Administrator Kelly Loeffler, a former U.S. Senator from Georgia, as a leader who pursues rapid action and moves at the speed of business, and Shimkat felt that despite its relatively small size compared to other federal agencies, the SBA is "punching above its weight." According to Shimkat, grant applicants needed to have a "fundamental program strength" along with buy-in from the community and a forward-thinking plan to take it to the next level, and IVCCD checked all of those boxes.

Understandably, the Iowan was thrilled to see IVCCD on the final list of recipients, and she also stressed the importance of ensuring that rural areas were included.

"What works in New York doesn't work in Arizona, and what works in Iowa doesn't work in Seattle, Washington. So we need to make sure that we're looking at everything from a wide swath vs. 'Hey, here's input we got from a large urban area, and that's what we're going to address.' It can't be that way, and the administrator sees this," she said, touting the Trump administration's pushes to relax regulations and cut taxes. "For the Small Business Administration to be able to work so closely with community colleges and trade schools, it's an honor. It is an absolute honor for us. We're so excited to see what the future brings, and I hope that I can come back here after you get some of that equipment coming in and we can take a look."

Zaun, a former Iowa state senator, spoke highly of Marshalltown as a community and noted that at his first business, a hardware store, he sold MARSHALLTOWN trowels. He said the president is actively working to grow the economy outside of major metropolitan areas, and Zaun was also excited to hear about the upcoming groundbreaking on the new MCC student housing project.

"One thing I do get to do is go to a lot of community colleges, and that's where it's at. That's where it's at for manufacturing," he said. "There's no doubt that there's certainly a need for our regent universities, but this is the greatest opportunity for students to have less debt. In fact, a lot of them don't have any debt because companies come in and pay their tuition. And they can make money as they're learning the skill that they want to learn."

MCC Provost Matt Schmit told Shimkat and Zaun that the additional funding would help the college to accelerate its efforts, and he looked forward to collaborating with a company like Colewell that specifically focuses on automation.

"The timing couldn't be better," Schmit said.

Stowell commented that he realized a few years ago his company would have to start homegrowing talent because, as he joked, "believe it or not, it's hard to get engineers to move to Montezuma, Iowa," and Carter praised Howsare Boyens and Schmit for their partnership while highlighting the need for individuals who can program and control robots, run CNC equipment and wire panels, among other things. He expressed optimism that the $5 million grant would go a long way toward meeting those needs.

From there, a group of students currently enrolled in the program arrived inside Dejardin alongside Robotics and Automation Faculty Member Amit Deb Nath, and Shimkat had a chance to ask them why they were pursuing the field. The overwhelming consensus? The high-paying job opportunities -- on average, between $80,000 and $90,000 a year upon entering the full-time workforce -- that are immediately available to them.

Zaun told them that with so many workers in the trades set to retire in the near future, there will be even more opportunities available soon, and Shimkat advised any of the students interested in owning their own companies someday to take a few business classes while they're still in college.

As the discussion and photo op wound down, Shimkat and Zaun spoke to the T-R about the long-term impact the grant will make on IVCCD and the communities it serves across four counties.

"At the SBA, under Administrator Loeffler and President Trump, we are really trying to build that American workforce to strengthen American manufacturing, because that's the key to what we need to get done, and with this grant, they'll be able to purchase equipment. They'll be able to beef up the programming here to make it a stronger program not only for the students, but also have them having better experiences and more experiences coming out of it with the training for the manufacturers that are in this area," Shimkat said. "There is a huge demand for these types of workers, and especially if they can get the right training on the right equipment. It is absolutely critical for the future of manufacturing domestically, and especially as we are focused on fair trade and really giving our domestic suppliers a fair shake at competing internationally, they need to have the workforce. If they don't have the workforce, they're not able to do that production, and in order to get the workforce, we need partnerships with community colleges and trade schools to really beef that up."

The district has a year to spend the grant funds, and Shimkat concluded that she hopes she'll get to return in the fall of 2027 and see the young men enrolled in the program putting their acquired skills to good use in high-paying jobs with state-of-the-art equipment and training.

Contact Robert Maharry at (641) 753-6611 ext. 255 or rmaharry@timesrepublican.com.

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