Career Center of Southern Illinois is expected to undergo a major change in scenery in the next few years as the facility long housed at the former U.S. Army Nike Missile Base east of Hecker has found a new home in Red Bud.

This prospective move was recently discussed at the latest Columbia School Board meeting, with similar talk among the Red Bud School Board, as covered by the North County News.

CCSI Director Stephanie Mohr spoke about how the current agreement came to be, recalling how about two years ago, Southwestern Illinois College began hosting regular meetings seeking public input about how best to utilize its Red Bud campus.

“I took that as an opportunity to go and talk about how CCSI and SWIC already have a very strong partnership,” Mohr said. “We offer lots of dual credit to our students through SWIC. A lot of our students matriculate on to SWIC.”

She further proposed a shared campus concept at the meeting, and SWIC board members and administrators soon reached out to further discuss such an arrangement.

Mohr noted CCSI exists through an agreement with 10 member school districts in the area – including Waterloo and Valmeyer – with leadership in these districts currently discussing the possibility of moving forward with CCSI finding a new home in Red Bud.

SWIC Chief of Enrollment Development and Institutional Planning Robert Tebbe also spoke about the current relationship that school has with CCSI and the work SWIC has done in recent years to improve the Red Bud campus in particular amid reduced enrollment.

“We have really good relationships with our K-12 educators,” Tebbe said. “We, a few years ago, realized we need to be doing more for the southern part of our district, and obviously we can’t just do one thing. We needed to improve our course scheduling.”

Tebbe placed emphasis not only on expanding the campus’ programming offerings but also strengthening relationships with schools in SWIC’s southern districts.

In discussing the campus’ renewed focus on career and technical education – a new CTE building is currently in development on the campus – he commended the work CCSI does in furthering trade education in the area.

“It’s also very important that we are creating pathways from the high school and even the grade school to the high school and the high school to the community college,” Tebbe said. “Those pathways align together, and that relationship needs to be with our southern district high schools. CCSI is a big part of that because they do such strong CTE programming at that site, and that’s a big kudos to Stephanie’s team.”

While Tebbe and Mohr spoke about how these talks have been going on over the past two years, Mohr offered further insight into the push for this change.

She emphasized the current state of CCSI’s facilities, which were originally built in the 1950s and have been repurposed to suit the needs of a nursing and trade school.

Mohr also spoke about the facility’s location, acknowledging that the campus being tucked away on a rural road off Route 159 between Hecker and Red Bud doesn’t make for the best traffic or community awareness.

“It has far exceeded its expected life span, I would say,” Mohr said. “I think that we, the staff at CCSI, have done a really great job of maintaining the campus over the years. However, the buildings are aging. They are becoming more difficult and expensive to maintain. Another part of that to consider is the location. Being so rurally located is just not ideal. For CCSI to potentially relocate to a new state-of-the-art facility in centrally-located Red Bud would be just ideal for the school and I think would help with our enrollment and help improve the opportunities that we are able to provide our students.”

The move to SWIC would mean the construction and leasing of an entirely new building on the college’s campus. Mohr noted that this would be a distinct facility from the aforementioned CTE building that’s currently in development.

As reported in the North County News, this facility would also be shared with Perandoe Special Education District, which has been housed at SWIC-Red Bud in some capacity since 2019, though has had trouble finding the right space and is facing the end of its lease in 2027, thus necessitating a new building and housing arrangement.

Mohr further spoke about the move as an opportunity to refresh CCSI’s image, seemingly referencing how the school has developed a somewhat negative reputation as a place for students some might call “troubled.”

Mohr previously discussed this reputation amid CCSI’s 50th anniversary. She emphasized the positive, describing the school as an alternative for students who might have dropped out of high school or simply didn’t learn well in a traditional school setting.

“I really think this is gonna be an opportunity for us to increase our enrollment,” Mohr said. “I think that there is a reputation that is tied to this campus, and in order for us to finally get out from under that reputation, a new campus would breathe new life into our school and our programming. I really anticipate this to be a very positive move.”

Speaking further on the benefits this change might have for CCSI, she said no plans are currently set to remove or change the school’s current programming, with talk even turning to how programming might even be expanded.

Mohr said the move is currently scheduled for before the 2027-28 school year.

She reiterated the fine work already being done by CCSI and emphasized the benefits a new facility will provide.

“Right now, specifically, there is such a need for individuals to work in the trades, and so we want to be able to really be a place where kids want to come to, where parents want to send their kids to in order to receive this high-quality career and technical education training,” Mohr said.