Drake State Community and Technical College President Patricia Sims doesn’t want her school to be “the last choice” for students seeking workforce training after graduating from high school.

“Our high schools are very nice,” she said. “If you leave a very nice high school and do post-secondary training, the expectation is that it is going to be at the next level. We have to get there. We have some work to do.”

Sims said the appearance of a campus can be a barrier in the recruitment of students. That is one reason the school is embarking on renovation and upgrading projects that right now are approaching $45 million.

About $30 million of that is going into the construction of a new advanced manufacturing center. The remaining $12-15 million is going toward the renovation of the college library and the renovation of an adjacent building into an expanded health sciences facility.

The advanced manufacturing center is being built on land recently acquired next to the campus on Meridian Street. According to Sims, it will be the first building constructed on the campus since the library, which opened in 2005.