Germanna Community College’s newest expansion in Stafford County will open its doors on Oct. 17 at the Center of Educational Excellence off Garrisonville Road.
Two buildings, the Barbara J. Fried Center and the Kevin L. Dillard Health Sciences Center at 25 Center St. total over 74,000 square feet and will allow Germanna to double student enrollment in the allied health services fields — especially nursing.
In addition, Germanna will be expanding its cybersecurity, IT, general education and dual enrollment programs there.
Center Street is the single biggest transaction and project ever undertaken by the Germanna Educational Foundation and will benefit the college and thousands of students over many years.
The entire $20 million project has been funded through partnerships, said Germanna President Janet Gullickson.
“Our Center Street expansion in Stafford is the fulfillment of a pledge I made to the county to provide a full-service college experience to the residents of Stafford when I arrived seven years ago,” Gullickson said in a press release. “Through the generosity of many partners, including Mary Washington Healthcare, Stafford County Economic Development, the Fried family, Kevin Dillard and Mary Jane O’Neill, as well as investment of college funds, we have realized that commitment.”
Students from Stafford County comprise the largest population of any locality served by Germanna.
Former Dean of Nursing Patti Lisk said the expansion will be a shot in the arm to the nursing and health sciences program because many applicants to the nursing program find it difficult to travel to the Locust Grove campus for classes. The Dillard Health Services building at 25 Center Street will be devoted to Germanna’s nursing and allied health technologies programs, the largest in the Virginia Community College System.
“Germanna’s campus expansion in Stafford is vital to our local workforce needs,” Lisk said in the release. “Our area needs 200 to 250 RNs, 100 LPNs and as many CNAs, surgical technologists and other healthcare professionals each year in our community for the foreseeable future.”
Within the region, nursing and allied health labor shortages match the rest of the nation at 18 to 25%. Additionally, the area’s labor shortage will worsen when the 450,000-square-foot Veterans Administration Clinic opens in 2024.
Germanna has committed to doubling its number of nursing and related graduates over the next three years in response to this critical shortage. The college will also support a community wellness center in the new Stafford facility.
The Center for Cybersecurity will be located in the Barbara J. Fried Center at 10 Center St. The college stated that the proximity of the new Center Street location to Quantico Marine Base and the FBI Academy makes it a natural location to train defense contractors serving the growing cybersecurity and law enforcement community. In 2019, Germanna was designated as a National Center of Academic Excellence in Cyber Defense Education by the National Security Agency and the Department of Homeland Security.
In 2018, Germanna leased an 18,921-square-foot building in Stafford that more than tripled the space available at a GCC center that opened at Aquia in 2009. The new Center Street facilities more than triple that existing space.
Classes begin at the new Germanna Stafford Center Street location this fall. The existing GCC Barbara J. Fried Center in Stafford remains open until then.
