OTC receives six-figure donations for manufacturing center

Ozarks Technical Community College announced two six-figure donations for the school's Robert W. Plaster Center for Advanced Manufacturing.

The Plaster Center's lobby will be named the Larry and Donna Snyder Atrium in honor of a donation from the OTC trustee and his wife, according to a news release. The Durham Co., along with affiliates L&W Industries and GEC Durham Industries, also made a donation for the Durham Company Student Lounge. The exact totals of the donations were undisclosed.

“I’ve been on OTC’s board for more than half of the college’s existence, and the Plaster manufacturing center is the most important project the college has ever undertaken,” Snyder said in the release. “By building this facility, OTC is investing in the economic future of southwest Missouri.”   

Snyder's namesake company, Larry Snyder & Co., last year rebranded to Snyder Construction Group, according to past reporting. He's been an OTC trustee since 2006. 

The Durham Co., a Lebanon-based manufacturer of electric products, recently announced plans to build a 45,000-square-foot electrical utility distribution equipment manufacturing facility in Buffalo at a price tag of $5 million.

“Durham founder George E. Carr is passionate about education,” said Jenny Carr, president of L&W Industries who is a member of the Plaster manufacturing center’s advisory board, in a separate release. “We recognize the importance of educating and training the workforce of the future, and we’re proud to make this investment in the Plaster manufacturing center.”

Crossland Construction Co. Inc. is serving as general contractor for the 120,000-square-foot Plaster Center designed by Dake Wells Architecture Inc. and Chicago-based Perkins & Will Inc., according to past reporting. The center will feature educational and training opportunities in robotics, fabrication, mechatronics, automation, and drafting and design, and it will house a business incubation center and OTC technical programs.

The center is scheduled to open in August 2022.

The November 2020 groundbreaking ceremony for the project also came with the announcement of a naming-level donation from the Robert W. Plaster Foundation.
 
Other donors include Emerson Electric Co. and Chip and Sylvia Sheppard, according to the release. Chip Sheppard is on the OTC Foundation Board of Directors.