Cottage Grove Place uses grant funds for apprenticeships

Cottage Grove Place in Cedar Rapids is helping employees explore new opportunities with funds from the Coronavirus Relief Fund Earn and Learn grant.

Gov. Kim Reynolds announced in November that 46 Iowa not-for-profits and businesses would receive grants ranging between $10,000 and $250,000, with $5.85 million in total being distributed.

Cottage Grove Place has received a portion of $132,440, split with Green Hills in Ames, another senior living community, according to an new release from the Governor's Office.

Cottage Grove Place houses around 70 residents in the health care center.

TalentGro, the workforce division of workforce development solutions business Hamilton-Ryker, based in Martin, Tenn., is the program sponsor and intermediary between the two centers.

The facilities submitted an application to receive grant funds, according to a news release from Hamilton-Ryker.

Both Cottage Grove Place and Green Hills will develop Registered Apprenticeship Programs in health care and culinary arts, bringing a total of 50 employees into the two programs.

Employees will be recruited from 'key regions of Iowa, whose job have been affected or eliminated due to the pandemic,” Hamilton-Ryker said in a news release.

Cottage Grove Place Executive Director David Snyder said the funds will go toward accommodating five nursing apprentices and six culinary apprentices, as well as materials and supplies.

The facility already brought on two nursing and one culinary apprentice.

Both programs will have on-the-job training and related technical instruction, according to the release.

The center previously had heard from people interested in an apprenticeship program, so the money will help jump-start a program already in demand.

'It's a great grant to be able to participate in, not only for our members of our community that have financial needs that they may not have been able to tap into before we were able to offer that to them,” Snyder said.

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