The Whitewater University Technology Park continues to take shape as CESA 2, the state's largest Cooperative Educational Service Agency, becomes the park's first major tenant.
CESA 2, headquartered in Milton, signed a 10-year lease to serve as an anchor tenant in the park's Innovation Center to be located on the City of Whitewater's east side. The state educational agency will occupy approximately 10,000 square feet of office and conference room space.
The Whitewater Community Development Authority approved the lease at its Jan. 25 meeting.
City Manager Kevin Brunner said he is excited that CESA 2 has decided to call Whitewater – and the Innovation Center – its new home.
"The agency offers extensive training for more than 70 school districts in southern Wisconsin with upwards of 100 people per day visiting the facility. This will bring a lot of people into the Whitewater community," Brunner said.
CESA 2 serves more than 135,000 students and 7,200 teachers in 74 school districts in the seven counties of Dane, Green, Jefferson, Kenosha, Racine, Rock and Walworth. The agency provides professional development opportunities for teachers and helps school districts with its regular and special education programs. Last year, nearly 3,000 students went through the agency's various driver education programs.
"CESA 2 is a great match for the Whitewater Innovation Center," said University of Wisconsin-Whitewater Chancellor Richard Telfer. "CESA 2's mission of providing education and training support services for the area districts is a natural fit with the work already being done on campus in the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater's College of Education. We look forward to partnering with CESA 2 and the many school districts it serves."
Gary Albrecht, CESA 2 administrator, said the agency was attracted to the Innovation Center because of the opportunity to work with UW-Whitewater.
"The university has one of the largest pre-service education programs in the state," Albrecht said. "This will be a good opportunity for us to familiarize future educators with CESA and to partner with UW-Whitewater to provide professional development opportunities to graduate students. We're very excited about the move."
Albrecht said 30 employees will work in the Innovation Center space.
CESA 2's lease will begin in February 2011.