A-B Tech’s new president Dennis King discussed plans for the school’s future during a Leadership Asheville Forum meeting Sept. 24 at Country Club of Asheville.

About 60 people attended the luncheon.

Dr. David Brown introduced King, noting that “A-B Tech is of the community — and for the community... We are fortunate in North Carolina to have a superb community college system, and even more fortunate to have one of the shining stars in the system at A-B Tech” in King.

Brown added that King “interviewed for his (current) job for 22 years. He has been at A-B Tech for 22 years. They tested him in every way... He was named the outstanding administrator by his colleagues at A-B Tech. He was raised in New Hampshire... and graduated from Rutgers... He got his doctorate from the University of Florida.”

He said King — in his LAF address — would be sharing “some of his aspirations, some of his hopes, some of his dreams....”

King began his 26-minute talk by alluding to Brown’s reference to his long tenure at A-B Tech, noting, “Yes, I’ve been there 22 years — and I’ve enjoyed every moment....

He said he was teased by family members, who wondered, “Would you trust $70m a year to this man?” So, King said, “you get humbled by the family. My brother has made it known that even though he’s proud of me, he’s still my older brother.”

As for A-B Tech, “We are not less than a college. Therefore, we’re not a junior college. The (community college) system was created in the 1950s... Almost all community colleges are located within a very few miles of the homes of those who are using them.”

Rhetorically, he asked, “What’s going on at A-B Tech?” In answering his own question, King said a recent story in the Asheville Citizen-Times focused on A-B Tech’s new craft brewing curriculum. “We have the first two-year brewing distillation and fermentation in the United States. We opened with 52 students wanting to sign up on first day, but we could only take 24 students.

“Right now, we’re just brewing beer... They were individuals with degrees in other fields, such as English, and now they wanted to get degrees in fields in which they could get jobs,” King said.

He added, “You can’t mention A-B Tech without mentioning our world-class culinary program... Thursday is the only day they serve through the culinary program... This is a culinary lab for both lunch and dinner, but only on Thursdays.

“Our culinary program has gone to the final four for eight times in last 10 years — only school with that status. We have won the award twice.”

With obvious enthusiasm, King added that “what also is going on right now is something I think is fantastic. GE Aviation is training on our campus for students to make ceramic parts. The owners of planes will be able to save $1 million per year with these parts — that’s an amazing savings.”

Further, he said GE Aviation is building a production facility on Sweeten Creek Road and “they’re gearing up making these light-weight parts that — they say — will revolutionize the industry.”

As for other A-B Tech activities, King said there is “lots of construction on Victoria Road.” He praised the Buncombe County Board of Commissioners for backing a referendum that passed recently, earmarking a portion of the county sales tax. It is expected to generate about $120 million over 10 years “that we will put into the infrastructure of our campus.”

With the growth spurt on the Asheville campus, “We are so crowded now (in many situations). All of that will change when our Allied Lab and Public Serbice building opens in about a year. It will be state of the art. There will be mannequins who simulate health problems.”

King then said he did not want to fail to mention “two other buildings on our campus —  one is a parking garage, which will be centrally located” and hold about 650 cars. “It’s similar to the one across from the courthouse on College Avenue. In addition, we’re building a multipurpose building... that will be able to seat 800 people at a time... So those are the construction projects that are going on now.”

What’s more, he noted, “We’re opening up a training facility in Woodfin.... for police, emergency services. We’ll occupy it and start teaching there full bore in January.”

In outlining his objectives for A-B Tech for the next 10 years, King cited the following:

• Master facilities planning

• “Security for our students,” which he labeled “the one I most worry about... We are very concerned about the A-B Tech campus. We have a two-lane road that runs through it. About 10,000 cars come through it on Victoria Road, daily. So we need a second exit from the campus,” for security purposes.

• “If my administration is going to be known for anything, it will be for support of the faculty. So I’d like to have an endowment for faculty development. If you think of a broken-down old English teacher like me, I probably don’t need as much development as, say, an engineering teacher. So it’s important that we train, and retrain, our faculty on a regular basis... Otherwise, we’ll be training people to fix eight-track stereos. We’d like to grow the endowment to a minimum of $1 million.”

• “We’re looking at adding physical therapy, occupational therapy, aviation (the ground school of flying), environmental engineering, culinalogy (high-quality meals in medical situations).

“That’s A-B Tech. We’re an intricate part of the community. We have a $70 million-plus budget this year,” with 1,100 full-time and part-time employees and 24,000 students per year... We awarded 1,800 degrees last year...

“A-B Tech is the community’s college,” King said, triggering applause. “We belong to Asheville and Buncombe County... And I look forward to many years of serving you.”