International Emphasis Fuels Excel Expansion - Business Examiner

COMOX VALLEY-BASED EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTION WINS TOP PROFESSIONAL BUSINESS HONOURS

Written by Mark MacDonald, Publisher, Vancouver Island Business Examiner

COMOX VALLEY – An emphasis on international markets has helped propel Excel Career College forward, and caught the attention of adjudicators of the Grant Thornton LLP Vancouver Island Business Excellence Awards.

Thus Executive Director Bisman Arora and President and Founder Pauline Stevenson stood up to receive Professional Business of the Year honors at the 21st edition of celebrating the best of the best in Vancouver Island business March 17 at the Delta Ocean Pointe Resort in Victoria.

“As entrepreneurs, we all know the amount of hard work and planning it takes to drive success, never more so given the last two years of uncertainty with the pandemic,” states Stevenson, who recently sold the educational institution to the Arora Group of Companies. “To be recognized for that was tremendously gratifying and humbling for our entire team who have gone above and beyond to continue to put our students success first every single day, despite the challenges over the last two years. Winning the award further provides my team with the inspiration to keep moving forward with tremendous ambition.”

Arora adds: “It was so invigorating to see such a diverse and prominent group of Vancouver Island businesses together in the same room. It gave me the opportunity to make some terrific connections and to get a sense of the depth of talent and innovation Vancouver Island businesses and entrepreneurs bring to the Island economy. The event was very well organized and a great opportunity for business owners to establish relationships and collaborate with each other.”

Excel, started by Stevenson in 1989, now has campuses in the Comox Valley (Courtenay and Comox), Victoria, Langford, Cranbrook and Williams Lake, and will be opening additional new locations in Kelowna and Surrey shortly. Arora has a 25 year history in Canadian education, student recruitment, immigration and foreign worker placements.

Aquaculture, healthcare and finance-related diplomas head the list of Excel’s main programs, complemented by short-module courses that feature specific development including bookkeeping and accounting, business communications, marine training, jobs search skills and customized training.

”We’ve been developing new, innovative hands-on learning programs to meet emerging industry demands including Digital Marketing and Business Management, Hospitality Management, Social Services and Community Support Worker, Medical Laboratory Assistant, Education Assistant, and Post-grad Supply Chain Program,” Arora notes. “These and others diploma programs have been identified through our industry partnerships as needing trained employees now. Our placement rates for students remains incredibly high because of our collaborations with key sectors and our new campuses mean we can bring graduates in more communities into new job markets.”

Stevenson points out that the international outreach initiative has been very exciting.

“In anticipation of the shift in restrictions, we started outreaching to the International markets and our networks including Mexico, Latin America, South East Asia, and Asia to restart our international student attraction efforts,” Stevenson notes. “We are seeing a great deal of optimism and interest from those countries relative to coming to Vancouver Island and the Okanagan for advanced education.”

Excel has developed all of its curriculum into a Learning Management System (LMS), designed for virtual delivery of training. It has expanded the reach of services outside of campus regions to allow access to those who would not have had access previously, and new programs continue to be developed to support employers experiencing shortages of highly skilled labour. That contributed greatly to Excel’s growth throughout the pandemic.

Arora states that Excel is in the people business.

“We put our student and the employers they will be working for first,” she adds. “Without both the students and employers, we cannot ‘Excel’.”

Read article in Business Examiner Magazine here (page 42).