When Karen Craigo sits in front of a television to watch reruns of “Bewitched,” the OTC adjunct English instructor doesn’t consider it wasting time. She calls it research. Craigo, who teaches English Composition I and II at the OTC Springfield Campus, is also a successful poet and is currently working on a book of poems…
Every school day, Gaila Wester has 514 hungry mouths to feed. She’s not feeding birds or taken in too many stray pets, she’s feeding kids at the Fordland Grade School. The “lunch lady,” as she calls herself, is learning new techniques and getting new ideas for ways to feed her Fordland flock as a student…
Mary Datema was surprised how easily the idea for her book about kids with special needs became crystal clear. “I was driving in the car when it came to me. It took about 20 minutes,” said the OTC adjunct Early Childhood Education instructor. And now Datema’s book “We Are All Stars” is available through Amazon.com.…
The audience at the April 6 High School Equivalency (formerly GED) graduation ceremony sat in silence as OTC student Ashley Smith told her emotional story of overcoming family and health issues to earn her high-school equivalency diploma, her college degree and a job with OTC. “School was my getaway,” she said. “I did well in…
Graduates, it’s coming. The moment we’ve all been waiting for. Our 2016 graduation ceremony will be held tomorrow, Thursday, May 12 at 6 p.m. at JQH Arena. If you’re celebrating your own graduation this year, or that of a fellow student, friend or family member, share your excitement on social media with the hashtag, #OTCgrad. Do you…
In the summer of 2016, there will be several construction projects on and around the Ozarks Technical Community College Springfield Campus. All of these improvements will impact parking and traffic flow on the OTC Springfield Campus. OTC will resurface a parking lot, City Utilities is moving a water line, the City of Springfield is relocating…
If you like getting your hands dirty while also studying the environment, then there’s a perfect program waiting for you at OTC. The Environmental Science Technology program offered at OTC’s Richwood Valley, Waynesville and Lebanon campuses, gives students a chance to focus on laboratory and field testing to monitor the environment and investigate sources of…
Nearly 20 OTC students, faculty and staff attended a 6-hour training on Saturday, April 30 to earn their Green Dot Bystander Intervention Certification. Participants learned how to respond safely as a bystander to prevent imminent or potential acts of sexual or interpersonal violence on campus. This training session was the second training held at OTC and the first facilitated entirely by OTC…
The OTC Job Fair is coming up on Wednesday, May 4 from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. at the OTC Springfield Campus in Lincoln Hall, room 211. The event is free and open to the public. Get details here. As a job-seeker, you’ll want to make an all-out effort to meet with every employer that…
It’s a good thing that Delilah DeRosa paid close attention when the subject of seizure care was discussed in her OTC Career Center Health Science class. Not long after that section of the class was discussed, Delilah had to put her knowledge to use helping a student back at her high school after he suffered…
The OTC Table Rock Campus is undergoing major changes thanks to a $1.9 million build-out of the nearly three-year-old building. OTC Table Rock President Cliff Davis led some Branson-area media through the building on Tuesday, April 12, pointing out the various changes and additions undergoing construction. Workers are busy on all of the floors installing,…
The Mystery Hour, Springfield’s first and only late-night talk show, will tape its 100th episode on Saturday, April 16 at 7:30 p.m. Since OTC sponsors the show, students, faculty and staff can attend Saturday’s taping at a discounted rate! You can learn more about The Mystery Hour and purchase tickets here (be sure to use the discount…
A group of OTC nursing students are headed to Nicaragua on April 9, but they aren’t going for a spring break vacation. They’re going with a purpose — to provide medical care to villagers who have little access to medical services. The 10 students and three faculty members will travel to several communities outside of…
A group of OTC surgical technology students won first place in the 2016 Missouri Association of Surgical Technologists Scrub Bowl competition. The event was held this month in St. Louis during the annual Missouri Association of Surgical Technologists conference. We would like to congratulate OTC Scrub Bowl team members (from left to right): Martha Butts, Ashlynn Harmon,…
History came alive at the Springfield-Greene County Library Center on Monday, March 28, thanks to some members of the OTC faculty and staff. The Ozark Mountain chapter of the Sons of the American Revolution presented the event, entitled “A General, A County and Two Soldiers,” during a meeting of History Explorers. The presentations by OTC…
From the age of 3, Lauren Sweet dreamed of being a zookeeper. Now, at age 21, the OTC graduate is living the dream as a zookeeper and giraffe trainer at Dickerson Park Zoo. “I loved animals growing up and always wanted to work with them,” said Lauren, who graduated from OTC last May with an…
More than 200 Robberson Elementary students spent the day with some of OTC’s technical education instructors as part of the school’s “What I want to be when I graduate high school” intersession field trip. Kids from kindergarten through fifth grade came to the Springfield campus and took part in hands-on demonstrations involving robots, landscaping, musical…
Exploding ping pong balls. Foaming test tubes. Bubbling beakers. All were part of the demonstrations presented to more than 200 high school students who came to the OTC Richwood Valley Campus Friday, March 18, to take part in a chemistry olympiad. The students took a first-year and advanced chemistry exam. The advanced exam was a…
OTC Early Childhood Education Center kiddos are all about “going green” this week. And no, it’s not for St. Patrick’s Day. These 3-, 4- and 5-year-olds can tell you the difference between paper, plastic and metal, and they know how to recycle all three materials. All week long, Ms. Susan and Ms. Megan’s preschoolers are…
Happy Pi Day to all you nerds out there (as well as those of you who use today as an excuse to eat pie — you know who you are). The number pi, denoted by the Greek letter π and pronounced “pie,” is one of the most common mathematical constants in the world. It is the circumference of any circle,…
Something other than baseballs was flying through the sky at Hammons Field recently. A group of OTC drafting and design students were at the baseball field Thursday, March 3, to watch a demonstration of drones and how they are used in the field for civil engineering and land surveying. Representatives from Olsson Associates, a civil…
A group of OTC dental students is finding out first hand what the OTC motto “Start Here, Go Anywhere” really means. From Feb. 27 through March 7, the students are in Managua, Masachapa, and San Rafael in Nicaragua to work at a community hospital and nearby villages offering dental services to the residents. A total…
Every year, Donnie Kendrick rubs elbows with some very special folks. The OTC Bookstore employee gathers with everyone from Dawn Wells of “Gilligan’s Island” to Lulu of “Hee Haw,” not to mention dozens upon dozens of presidential descendants. Kendrick is gathered with celebrities because of his family connection to Mary Todd Lincoln.
A small classroom on the OTC Springfield Campus is filled with the excited chatter of students hard at work assembling parts to build a small machine. “I get to be one of the first to do this,” said Tyler Letterman, an Industrial Maintenance Technology student from Fordland. “It’s cool to be the first in the…
Kyle Houston knew he wanted to be a chef when he was just a youngster watching his grandmother make rolls at 6 in the morning. But it wasn’t until he came to the OTC Career Center as a senior at Republic High School that he was able to change his dream into reality. “I was…