DEL VALLE, Texas — On Thursday, Austin-based electric vehicle manufacturer Tesla announced a new $600,000 donation to Del Valle ISD that will pay for training equipment at Early College High School’s Gigafactory P-TECH Manufacturing Studio.
For the past few years, Tesla has been working with the district to prepare students to walk into sought after jobs in the industry straight after graduation. Through the Manufacturing Development Program, 144 students in Del Valle ISD have gotten full-time jobs at Tesla’s Gigafactory in Austin.
Jasmine Tamayo, a graduate of Del Valle ISD, was one of those students who became employed by Tesla after her graduation.
“I never thought that the opportunity of being able to work at Tesla would ever come true,” Tamayo said.
During high school, Tamayo wasn’t sure about her career path, but after her school encouraged her to get a job with Tesla and gave trained her, she found a new passion working with vehicles. She went from knowing nothing about cars to seeing her work on the Tesla Cybertruck driving around town.
“It’s really cool to look at them and think, I built that, and I did that, me and my team,” Tamayo said.
Since the district's partnership with Tesla began, 207 students have also gotten internships with the company. These students are able to get hands-on experience while they’re earning their high school or Austin Community College diploma.
“One of the things that I always tell our business and industry partners is that I truly want them to develop a plan and a partnership with us, or our students are building an authentic internship plan or career plan so that whatever it is that they're learning in high school truly aligns to their business and industry pathway,” Del Valle ISD Superintendent Dr. Annette Tielle said.
Tesla’s new donation will fund the purchase of equipment for the district’s manufacturing studio, so students can receive important and relevant training while in school.
“Many of the pieces of equipment that we will have will mirror what is at the Gigafactory at Tesla,” Tielle said.
The studio is still under construction, but with this new donation from Tesla, the district plans to open it for the fall semester in August 2024 and have about 500 students there.
Boomtown is KVUE's series covering the explosive growth in Central Texas. For more Boomtown stories, head to KVUE.com/Boomtown.