By Staff
CULINARY ARTS Students in the culinary arts program at Ross Collins Career and Technical Center cook chili earlier this week. Pictured, from left, are Wencee Stidmon, Artina Orum, Brittany Schulski and Marie Brown. PHOTO BY LYNETTE WILSON / THE MERIDIAN STAR
By Lynette Wilson / staff writer
Nov. 7, 2002
Hartley Peavey was the youngest student ever to attend Ross Collins when it was still a vocational center.
The chief executive officer of Peavey Electronics took shop classes the summer before the seventh grade. By the time he graduated high school, Peavey had taken shops in sheet metal, radio, basic and advanced electricity and machines.
Peavey said his uncle, Dick Wiggins, ran the machine shop at Ross Collins. Uncle Dick's son, Dick Wiggins Jr., taught basic electricity.
Both men, he said, encouraged his vocational training.
60th anniversary
On Monday, Ross Collins Career and Technical Center will celebrate its 60th anniversary with a program, reception and tour of the center. The program will begin at 10 a.m. in the school's Hartley D. Peavey Auditorium.
Wayne Eason, the center's director, said most people don't realize that Ross Collins was the first vocational training center built in Mississippi.
He said Ross Collins offers 15 occupational programs that provide students with the entry-level skills needed to enter fields such as welding, carpentry, auto body repair and culinary arts.
About 500 students are enrolled. They include sophomores, juniors and seniors from Meridian and Lauderdale County as well as students from private and home schools.
Eason said vocational training courses employ advanced computer technologies and that students must possess the skills to use them.
Longtime teacher
Ronnie Beech taught electricity for 14 years at Ross Collins before becoming the cooperative education instructor. He said students study commercial, industrial and residential wiring, with an emphasis on residential.
Some of his students have gone on to become union apprentices, or have gone to work for contractors. Some have used electricity as a stepping stone to electrical engineering.
Jimmie Evans has taught small engine repair for more than 26 years, and said he gets a thrill when he sees one of his students working in the field.
Evans keeps current by attending seminars and by talking regularly with mechanics on his Craft Committee.
Some of Evans' students have gone on to open their own engine repair shops.
The advantages
Mitch Johnson, a junior at Meridian High School, said there are advantages to taking classes at Ross Collins as opposed to the high school. Classes last a full year rather than nine weeks, and are smaller so students receive more one-on-one attention.
Johnson is taking marketing management technology. His class will take a field trip to the Mercedes plant on Interstate 20/59 in Alabama next week.
Peavey said it is vital that our education system teach young people a trade.