Perry residents now have a new option for college classes.

Des Moines Area Community College (DMACC) last month completed construction on a 15,000-square-foot facility in Perry, the VanKirk Career Academy. The academy will serve high school and adult classes.

Classes began this fall semester with 140 high school students and 120 adults enrolled. The career academy joins a similar facility in Ames and could precede a facility in south Des Moines.

What makes the VanKirk facility unique is the community’s involvement in getting the facility built. Perry officials expressed interest in getting a DMACC presence in the town, but the college didn’t have money in the budget for it, DMACC President Rob Denson said. So the city, led by capital campaign chairman Bill Clark, raised $1.3 million and got another $1.55 million through the state’s I-Jobs program.

“There’s probably no other town maybe in the country, but certainly in Iowa, that’s taken this kind of leadership to put together a program,” Denson said

The primary focus of the career academy, which is led by director Jenny Foster, is to teach classes to high school students in Perry and surrounding schools. Classes will focus on vocational training not offered at the high school, such as health programming, welding, automotive technology, teacher education, computer technologies, building trades and culinary arts. Foster has been meeting with high school principals and counselors to find out what programs students want. She also met with students last school year to help prepare them for the program and tell them about what to expect from classes.

The same classes will be offered to adults throughout the day and on nights and weekends on an on-demand basis. Denson expects the facility to serve between 300 and 500 students a year.

DMACC is proposing building another career academy at Southridge Mall that would serve high school students from Indianola, Norwalk and other surrounding schools and also offer adult classes.