Porter County Career & Technical Center students Tate Kwiecinski, center, and Turner West chat with Rick Calinski during a grand opening ceremony for the center's alternative energy demonstration area Wednesday Jan. 16, 2013. Calinski is a public affiars manager for NIPSCO which was a supporter of the project. | Andy Lavalley~Sun-Times Media
Jon Groth smiles while answering questions during a press conference at the Porter County Career & Technical Center in Valparaiso Wednesday Jan. 16, 2013. Groth, Director of Career and Technical Education Porter County Education Services, held a grand opening for the center's alternative energy demonstraton area which includes 32 student-installed photovoltaic panels. | Andy Lavalley~Sun-Times Media
NIPSCO president Kathleen O'Leary, center, talks chats with students following a ribbon-cutting for an alterantive energy demonstration area at the Porter County Career and Technical Center in Valparaiso Wednesday Jan. 16, 2013. Students recently installed 32 photovoltaic panels on the roof of the school. | Andy Lavalley~Sun-Times Media
NIPSCO president Kathleen O'Leary congratulates Ben Brubaker following a ribbon cutting at the alternative energy dispay area on the roof of the Porter County Career & Technical center in Valparaiso Wednesday Jan. 16, 2013. Brubaker, a senior at Valparaiso High School, is one of many center students who installed photovoltaic cells on the roof of the center. | Andy Lavalley~Sun-Times Media
A series of 32 photovoltaic panels face south on the roof of the Porter County Career & Technical Center in Valparaiso Wednesdsay Jan. 16, 2013. Students helped install the panels as well as a wind turbine. The center held a grand opening for the alternative energy demonstration area of the school. | Andy Lavalley~Sun-Times Media
Surgical team: Hospitals in Franciscan Alliance's Northern Indiana Region can offer a full array of cardiovascular and thoracic surgical services due to a partnership between the hospitals' staff and specialists from Cardiothoracic & Vascular Surgical Associates S.C. | Supplied photo
Fulfilling career: Nurse Mary Otting (right), who now teaches at Lewis University after volunteering for years at disaster sites, talks with Lewis student nurses, Allysha Jones (left) and Mary Kitchin, at Lewis's Oak Brook campus. | Mary Compton ~ For Sun-Times Media
Utility company offers buy-back programs for alternative energy
It was a bitterly cold but sunny day as students and instructors at the Porter County Career & Technical Center recently led a couple dozen people onto the roof of the Valparaiso building, where some of its students had installed a 32-panel solar array. “Today … Read More