{"id":34814,"date":"2026-06-23T09:30:02","date_gmt":"2026-06-23T13:30:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/necc.edu\/newsroom\/?p=34814"},"modified":"2026-06-23T09:30:02","modified_gmt":"2026-06-23T13:30:02","slug":"secretary-of-education-visits-necc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/necc.edu\/newsroom\/2026\/06\/23\/secretary-of-education-visits-necc\/","title":{"rendered":"Secretary of Education Visits NECC"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Haverhill, MA (June 23, 2026) \u2014 Massachusetts Secretary of Education Stephen Zrike made his first visit to Northern Essex Community College since his <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mass.gov\/news\/governor-healey-appoints-dr-stephen-zrike-jr-as-secretary-of-education\">appointment to the role<\/a> earlier this year. Secretary Zrike met with college leadership to discuss several topics, including the college&#8217;s initiatives to address critical workforce needs and increase degree attainment, such as CTE\/Early College partnerships, apprenticeships and workforce development programs.<\/p>\n<p>Leadership also shared plans for the creation of a Fabrication Lab on the Haverhill Campus. The 7,000+ sq. ft. shovel\u2010ready, modular, cost\u2010effective facility is designed to deliver integrated, hands\u2010on learning across multiple high\u2010demand technical pathways. Secretary Zrike&#8217;s visit concluded with a tour of the soon-to-be-completed Tech Tower: three floors of innovation labs dedicated to employer-aligned technical education.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_34815\" style=\"width: 599px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"http:\/\/necc.edu\/newsroom\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/11\/2026\/06\/TechTower4-scaled.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-34815\" class=\" wp-image-34815\" src=\"http:\/\/necc.edu\/newsroom\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/11\/2026\/06\/TechTower4-1030x773.jpg\" alt=\"group shot inside NECC's tech tower, a room under construction\" width=\"589\" height=\"442\" srcset=\"https:\/\/necc.edu\/newsroom\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/11\/2026\/06\/TechTower4-1030x773.jpg 1030w, https:\/\/necc.edu\/newsroom\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/11\/2026\/06\/TechTower4-300x225.jpg 300w, https:\/\/necc.edu\/newsroom\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/11\/2026\/06\/TechTower4-768x576.jpg 768w, https:\/\/necc.edu\/newsroom\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/11\/2026\/06\/TechTower4-1536x1152.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/necc.edu\/newsroom\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/11\/2026\/06\/TechTower4-2048x1536.jpg 2048w, https:\/\/necc.edu\/newsroom\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/11\/2026\/06\/TechTower4-347x260.jpg 347w, https:\/\/necc.edu\/newsroom\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/11\/2026\/06\/TechTower4-1500x1125.jpg 1500w, https:\/\/necc.edu\/newsroom\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/11\/2026\/06\/TechTower4-705x529.jpg 705w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 589px) 100vw, 589px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-34815\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Inside one of the labs under construction in NECC&#8217;s Tech Tower<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Haverhill, MA (June 23, 2026) \u2014 Massachusetts Secretary of Education Stephen Zrike made his first visit to Northern Essex Community College since his appointment to the role earlier this year. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":130,"featured_media":34817,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[756,14,758],"tags":[779,780,777,778],"class_list":["post-34814","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-campus-community","category-featured","category-headline","tag-fab-lab","tag-manufacturing","tag-secretary-of-education","tag-tech-tower"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.2 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Secretary of Education Visits NECC - NECC News<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Secretary Zrike met with college leadership to discuss several topics, including the college&#039;s initiatives to address critical workforce needs and increase degree attainment\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/necc.edu\/newsroom\/2026\/06\/23\/secretary-of-education-visits-necc\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Secretary of Education Visits NECC - 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