Butler Tech expands Bioscience Center
The county’s career and technical school expects an additional 200 students to enroll in its healthcare programs within the next two academic years.
An expansion for Butler Tech’s Bioscience Center in West Chester is nearly complete, with finishing touches and furniture being moved in this month.
By the first week of March, some of the new classrooms constructed on the back of the original building were already full of students.
For the past year and a half, Butler Tech, the county’s career and technical education center, has invested around $12 million, including funding from the state’s biennium budget and an Ohio Career Technical Education Equipment grant, to build an additional 28,000 square feet onto its Bioscience Center in West Chester.
The expansion was built on the back of the existing building and includes several classrooms on the top and bottom floors, as well as labs and group and individual study spaces. A clinic on the first floor was also added, in which the school will partner with Primary Health Solutions to see patients.
The school also received new equipment, including dental and phlebotomy chairs – used primarily for drawing blood – stations, exercise equipment and other tools.
“It’s much more representative of what they’ll see out in the real field and what they’ll be working in because we were just making do,” Principal Abbie Cook said of the new equipment and spaces. “Now it looks professional and great.”
With the additional space, Cook said the school was able to add two groups of sophomores and increase the healthcare science program by 50 additional spots.
“(There’s) a huge need in the area,” Cook said of healthcare science professionals. “Last year … we were only able to bring in about 50% of (students) that applied for that program, so we turned away a lot of kids, and that has become a theme at Butler Tech.”
The Bioscience Center is not the only expansion Butler Tech has recently made as part of an effort to take on more students. A new Aviation Center was also recently completed, as well as an Advanced Manufacturing Hub in partnership with Miami.
Currently, Cook said the Bioscience Center has more than 400 high school students. Next academic year, 2026-27, she said the school expects to have more than 500 students. For the following academic year, 2027-28, she expects over 600.
Butler Tech also added a 1+3 Bachelor of Science in Nursing (BSN) program, which opened for enrollment this academic year, in which students can finish one year of a BSN degree at Miami University while attending Butler Tech for three years of high school.
With the expansion, Cook said Miami professors now have space to hold classes at the West Chester campus, instead of having students commute to the Oxford campus. The existing high school-level Licensed Practical Nurse (LPN) program will also be able to move into the expansion.
Adult bioscience courses, which were previously held at the LeSourdsville campus, will now also be able to move into the building expansion. According to Cook, the adult programs represent more than 100 students.
“We have some more ideas of some additional things to do,” Cook said. “We really utilize every square inch of the space we have, so it really does bother us around our district when we can’t find a spot for a student, so we’re really trying to be creative.”
Within the next two years, although she couldn’t yet be specific, Cook said there may be other changes to create additional opportunities for students.
High school senior John Kollie, 17, is in the healthcare science program at Butler Tech, taking medical assisting (MA) courses.
Kollie recently joined the 1+3 BSN program and has already been certified as an electrocardiogram (EKG) technician. When he graduates, he will already be able to work in a hospital. He hopes to attend the University of Cincinnati for biological science and work as an MA and certified phlebotomist.
Kollie said he has always been fascinated by healthcare science, as his mother is a nurse, and his ultimate goal is to become a cardiologist.
During the construction at the West Chester campus, Kollie said he had to attend class in a temporary classroom, a trailer, set up outside due to a lack of space. He said of the expansion to his school, “I really appreciate it.”
“The fact that they're expanding the building, allowing more people to join into the programs, making the classrooms bigger … so we can expand our classes, … giving us the supplies, and they kind of give us what we need to do better,” Kollie said. “I feel like they're seeing us, right? They're like, ‘OK, this guy who wants to become a doctor, let's help him become a doctor.’”
High school senior Ellie Price, 18, is in the Certified Nursing Assistant (CNA) program in the health science program at Butler Tech and is taking phlebotomy courses and trying to earn her EKG technician certification. She is also in the 1+3 BSN program and intends to study at Miami when she graduates.
Price said she always wanted to go into a healthcare profession and loves the freedom and responsibility of studying at Butler Tech’s Bioscience Center. Beginning this month, she intends to work at a local nursing home where she’s already been offered a job.
Price said the expansion has allowed each student in phlebotomy to have their own station to spread out, with individual chairs where students can practice drawing blood, a sink and a stocked cabinet. She said she’s already taken advantage of the additional space and equipment offered for the exercise science program.
“I hang out a lot with the exercise people,” Price said. “They have a new space too, and it’s huge, and we play football or soccer. Today, we were passing a ball just in the open space.”
A public ribbon-cutting ceremony for the expansion will be hosted on April 13 at 10 a.m.
