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VALLEY — On Wednesday morning, the Greater Valley Area Chamber of Commerce hosted a grand opening event at the newest location of the One On One Technical College. It’s located just off 48th Street, which leads to EAMC-Lanier Hospital. One On One’s main location is in Phenix City, and it has a second location in Opelika.

One On One is a unit of the private school licensure division of the Alabama Community College System. It provides ten short training programs that allow students to go directly into the workforce. The Valley location will be able to accommodate up to 150 students every week. One On One’s Phenix City campus graduated over 500 students this past year.

The Valley campus will offer instruction that leads to being an administrative medical assistant, a medical billing and coding clerk, a patient care tech, a phlebotomy specialist, a health records clerk and a pharmacy tech.

Denise Scott is the dean of the Valley campus. She’s a Chambers County native.

“It is always exciting when we have a ribbon-cutting,” said Greater Valley Area Chamber of Commerce Executive Director Carrie Royster. “It means that we are having growth in the local area.”

Mayor Leonard Riley said that One On One Technical College is the 25th new business to have opened in Valley in the last year and a half.

“We have three or four more new businesses that will be opening in the near future as well. We are a growing community,” Riley said. “John Soules Foods will be bringing hundreds of new jobs to our community in a few years. A new transmission plant coming to West Point will bring hundreds more.”

Headquartered in Tyler, Texas, John Soules Foods is the nation’s largest producer of chicken and beef fajitas. When their new Valley plant goes into production late this summer, it will be processing an estimated 140 million pounds of beef and chicken in a single year. The company has already started hiring locally.

“I want to welcome One On One Technical College to Valley,” Riley said. “I know that EAMC-Lanier Administrator Greg Nichols is looking for new employees every day just like we are with the City of Valley.”

“We are a fast-track college,” said Shakea Miller, One On One Chancellor. “Our goal is to give people the skills to get good jobs. The need for healthcare workers is never going away.”