Western Maricopa Education Center, known as West-MEC, broke ground on its new Advanced Manufacturing and Welding building and Electric Vehicle (EV) bay addition to the Northeast campus located in Phoenix at the intersection of 19th Avenue and West Deer Valley Road. The $13.5 million project was designed by Orcutt | Winslow and is being constructed by McCarthy Building Companies Inc.
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The two key components being added include a 16,500-square-foot Advanced Manufacturing and Welding building that will feature an advanced manufacturing lab with an ISO-X cleanroom and state-of-the-art equipment as well as a 2,000-square-foot EV bay addition.
“West-MEC is thrilled to introduce new state-of-the-art facilities at our Northeast Campus, designed to meet the growing workforce demands of the West Valley. Through strategic partnerships and in-depth discussions with industry leaders such as Amkor, Gatorade, Nestle and TSMC, we’ve identified critical workforce needs and developed programs that will empower students to fill these essential roles,” said West-MEC Superintendent Dr. Scott Spurgeon.
With over 3,000 square feet of classroom and collaboration space, the facility is designed to enhance hands-on learning opportunities, specifically to prepare students for direct placement into manufacturing industry career opportunities. The Advanced Manufacturing and Welding building will also contain a dedicated welding instructional lab with 25 individual Lincoln Welding Booths, equipped with a specialized Lincoln exhaust system. Coupled with this interior lab space, the welding program will feature an exterior welding yard with individual sandblasting and plasma cutting stations.
The EV bay addition, in which former office space is being renovated and outfitted to create a cutting-edge teaching facility for EV technology, features a car lift as the facility’s focal point. The EV bay will support student learning with various instructional areas and first-hand demonstrations.
“Advanced manufacturing and electric vehicle technology are becoming increasingly prevalent in today’s STEM career programs and are skills needed by businesses in Arizona and elsewhere,” said McCarthy Project Director Tyler Shupe. “Equipping students, as early as high school, with skills in the use of some of the most advanced technologies and industry-leading equipment is very exciting to our team. Being able to help students and train the future workforce for these expanding industries makes projects like this incredibly rewarding for us.”
Construction of the campus expansion began in September, with both portions of the project projected to be completed by August 2025 for the start of the 2025-2026 school year. The rapid 10-month timeline is a direct result of Orcutt | Winslow’s self-certification permitting process with in-house plan review and permitting.
“Orcutt | Winslow is proud to have partnered with West-MEC and McCarthy Building Companies on this path-breaking, innovative addition to the Northeast Campus,” said Saravanan Bala, Orcutt | Winslow partner. “The advanced manufacturing, welding and EV Tech programs will serve to enhance West-MEC’s already fantastic program offerings and further burnish their reputation as a beacon for innovation in greater Maricopa county!”
West-MEC’s Northeast campus is home to Advanced Manufacturing, Welding, Medical Assisting, Coding, Automotive Technology, Veterinary Science, Pharmacy Science, Collision Repair & Refinishing, and Construction Technology programs, among others, to instruct high school students in the Phoenix Metropolitan area in one of the state’s largest career and technical education (CTE) curriculums.
The addition of these new facilities enhances West-MEC’s commitment to its core values of innovation, collaboration, and excellence, with the mission to equip students with the skills needed to thrive in today’s competitive job market.