By Wendy Porter, ICT-DM Regional Director, Far North Region
Butte College is pleased to have this new chance for students to access the thriving entrepreneurial and tech hub in downtown Chico. Chicostart represents a perfect example of cross-sector integration as they support both entrepreneurship and ICT-DM endeavors. We hope to attract Butte business and entrepreneurship students as well as ICT-DM students to interact with each other and these businesses not only in the shared office space but through mentoring, Slack teams, and events. Chicostart facilitates the tech industry partnership growTECH which is led by over 40 local tech businesses many of which are successful startups. These are the businesses we work with to offer students job shadowing, industry tours, in class visits and event connections.
“It’s exciting to offer this partnership between local tech employers and Butte College students. Our goal is to be a catalyst toward future employment opportunities for students. This affiliation will also help bring visibility for our local tech and startup businesses to the many education programs and students at Butte College,” said Wendy Porter, Regional Director, Employer Engagement, Information Communication Technology and Digital Media Far North Region hosted at Butte College.
Butte students who are interested may use the Chicostart shared office space for free at their convenience between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m., Monday through Friday. Students can benefit from engaging tech and entrepreneurial events, high-speed internet, large and small conference rooms, a kitchen, lounge areas, and whiteboards at their disposal. Chicostart has diligent COVID practices in place such as disinfecting, social distancing, and face mask requirements. Students can now coordinate with their instructors and Wendy Porter to get approved to access the facility.
“I look forward to this new cooperative between Butte College and Chicostart. Students have an added learning experience by working closely with Chicostart’s growTECH initiative and partners. Students will be able to interact with local industry in multiple ways which strengthens their education and pathway to employment,” said Linda Fischer, Butte College instructor.
Chicostart not only supports and incubates startups, they also facilitate our local tech industry partnership growTECH, which is composed of over 40 businesses who have a shared interest in uplifting our local tech community and developing a strong tech talent pool. Butte College is a critical partner in this endeavor.
“This provides a clear pathway for students to work directly with industry, get hands-on incubator curriculum, and mentoring for pursuing their entrepreneurial goals. Whether their goals are in high tech, informational technology, communications, virtual reality, digital media, cybersecurity, software development, web design, data science, AI/machine learning or business intelligence,” said Eva Shepherd-Nicoll, Chicostart Executive Director. “This partnership enables students to align with industry-led needs.”
About Chicostart
Chicostart is the center of the startup and small business ecosystem for the North State. Covering 15 counties, we exist to remove the barriers for startups and small businesses to thrive, and serve businesses owned by racially and ethnically underrepresented individuals. We have created an ecosystem that networks the resources, support, and technical assistance to help business. As the central liaison for this regional ecosystem, we connect them to industry, funding, agency, education, makerspaces, workforce development, grants, mentoring, events and more. We host a startup incubator, coworking space and drive industry-to-industry partnerships for economic development. We help you START, GROW AND THRIVE!
About Butte College
Butte College serves 14,890 students a year and is an accredited community college located just 75 miles north of Sacramento. Butte College offers a quality education and over 200 degree, certificate, and transfer programs. Students can earn associate degrees, train for career options, or take general education classes to transfer to a CSU, UC, or private university. Butte College has the highest transfer rate to CSU, Chico, and many of our alumni have successful careers in fire, nursing, law enforcement, welding, business, computer science, heavy equipment and more. The College also offers degrees with guaranteed transfer to California State Universities—with more than 30 Associate in Arts for Transfer and Associate in Science for Transfer degrees.
For more information, contact:
Wendy Porter
ICT-DM Regional Director Employer Engagement Far North Region
Hosted at Butte College
Powered by CA. Community Colleges
porterwe@butte.edu