Ivanka Trump observes high-tech professional development programs at Iowa school

Jason Noble Brianne Pfannenstiel
The Des Moines Register

Presidential adviser Ivanka Trump observed student demonstrations in robotics, science and coding Monday morning as part of her tour of a high-tech professional development program in the Waukee School District.

First Daughter and presidential adviser Ivanka Trump visited Iowa Monday morning, March 19, 2018, to discuss one of Gov. Kim Reynolds' top issues: workforce development and high-tech education.

One student demonstrated a wind tunnel to Trump by blowing compressed air past a miniature wind turbine, and another invited her to help write code for the software operating the device. 

"This is so amazing," Trump said as she entered the school. "This is such a cool place to come. It’s going to be hard to get rid of us."

The visit is part of Trump’s wider efforts to support the White House’s infrastructure plan, which includes measures to expand federal job training programs.

It also aligns with Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds' focus on expanding workforce development programs and education in high-growth fields like science, technology, engineering and math, or STEM. Reynolds, who is running for election to a full term this year, was on hand Monday along with acting Lt. Gov. Adam Gregg.

Known as APEX, the airy, gleaming education complex looks like a Silicon Valley tech HQ, complete with massive asymmetrical windows, a wide-open atrium strewn with eclectic seating options and garage-style overhead doors that open onto classrooms.

Waukee APEX allows students from Waukee High School and other area schools to explore various career paths through hands-on projects and work experiences with local employers. Students gain experience in fields like engineering, biosciences, insurance and business technology and communications. 

Following the tour and demonstrations, Trump and Reynolds headed a roundtable discussion featuring state officials, business leaders, school officials and students in a glass-walled second-floor conference room at the APEX school. 

“This is an unbelievable example of innovation in education and pairing the skills being taught in the classroom environment with the jobs in demand in modern economies,” Trump said of APEX. 

She outlined the administration’s commitment to a wide-ranging infrastructure bill that includes workforce development initiatives.

The White House proposal will emphasize rural infrastructure development, rural broadband and expand the existing Perkins and Pell Grant education programs to fund more training programs, Trump said, and the federal Department of Labor is already working on changing apprenticeship programs to expand access and increase their use by employers. 

Trump twice during the roundtable brought up her interest in encouraging more women and people of color to pursue careers in science, technology and engineering – and her excitement in seeing so many female students in the classes she visited. 

“As we embark on the fourth industrial revolution, it’s critical that that trajectory changes and that more women and girls get involved in these important, lucrative, high-paying fields of the future,” she said. 

Trump's visit to APEX follows a similar tour last summer by Apple CEO Tim Cook, who dropped in when the company announced its major data-center project. Trump said on Monday that Cook contacted her after that trip imploring her to visit it herself. 

“He had just left Iowa and must have sent me a note from the plane,” she said. “He said, ‘You have to go visit this facility in Iowa’ because the tour blew him away.” 

Reynolds and Trump have worked together on such issues over the last year, including during a meeting in Washington, D.C., last December after which Reynolds tweeted that they had discussed the Waukee program among other such work-based learning programs around the state.

Last September, Reynolds joined Ivanka Trump in announcing a White House computer science education initiative.

Prior to arriving, Trump posted photos on her Instagram account from Terrace Hill, the governor’s residence in downtown Des Moines, where she shared breakfast with Reynolds and her husband. 

Ivanka Trump is the latest of several high-profile administration officials to visit Iowa over the last year. Vice President Mike Pence was in Council Bluffs earlier this month and in Boone last June, while U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Sonny Perdue has already made several trips to the state.

President Donald Trump toured a community college and held a campaign-style rally in Cedar Rapids last June.