GREENSBORO — GuiilfordWorks held a ribbon-cutting ceremony on Tuesday, April 27, 2021, to introduce the long-anticipated NCWorks Mobile Career Center. This mobile classroom will allow GuilfordWorks, NCWorks Career Center Staff and other partner agencies to provide services equitably to those throughout the community who currently have limited access to the two brick-and-mortar NCWorks Career Centers or to Wi-Fi.

The Ribbon-Cutting Ceremony was a huge success, despite the windy conditions. We had an incredible turnout and excellent speakers, including Greensboro Mayor Nancy Vaughn and U.S. House Representative Kathy Manning. See the full presentation below.

The mobile career center was manufactured wholly by Spevco, a leading supplier of mobile exhibition trailers, hospitality trailers, industrial trailers and mobile marketing vehicles.

The exterior illustration — which highlights both the in-demand and emerging industries important to this area — was created by Able&Co., a strategic marketing and communications agency in Raleigh, NC.

Over the last year, our board has set out to reimagine workforce development in Guilford County. One of the key parts of our strategy has been to meet customers where they are.

– Harley Garrison, Chair, GuilfordWorks

The interior of the mobile career center houses an abundance of technology, including 12 laptop computers, two television monitors, which have multiple streaming options, and wi-fi connectivity. The interior can also be reconfigured in multiple ways, including as a classroom.

The interior also contains an ADA-compliant restroom facility complete with a sink and sanitizing station.

More importantly, on the day of the ribbon-cutting event, the interior housed cupcakes.

The exterior passenger side of the vehicle includes yet another television monitor, which extends the classroom configuration, and a retractable awning to shield event participants from the weather. 

Most importantly, there are two means of egress; a swinging door in the front with retractable stairs and a wheelchair ramp in the rear capable of lifting over 1,000 pounds.

Both sides of the vehicle retract for easy transport. During use, both sides expand to create over 320 square feet of usable interior space.

Throughout this pandemic, we recognized that members of our community have not had equitable opportunities to access services in person. And, trying to do so in a virtual environment has been equally challenging.

– Chris Rivera, Executive Director, GuilfordWorks

The ribbon-cutting event was just the first of many events scheduled in the coming months. We are extremely excited by the potential that the NCWorks Mobile Career Center provides, and the possibilities for impacting the community moving forward.