With the merging of the Ypsilanti Public Schools and Willow Run Community Schools districts, students attending the new Ypsilanti Community School district will have more opportunities for vocational training next year.

Superintendent Scott Menzel said, in addition to the three courses offered through the Ypsilanti Regional Career Technical Center, the district also is likely to offer two additional courses through Washtenaw Community College.

“We had to revisit how we were structured,” he said. “That’s the process we’ve been undergoing.”

The district is planning on offering a course on construction trades in the fall and adding a certified nurse assistant program in the winter, both through a partnership with WCC. The RCTC now offers auto technician, auto collision and culinary arts and hospitality courses.

New vocational programs are on the horizon for the newly formed Ypsilanti Community School district.

The decision comes after uncertainty regarding whether the RCTC would be reopened at all next year. Bill Burnette, director of the RCTC, said he and the center’s other four staff members received letters in May saying the district was not sure it would be offering the programs through the RCTC and would decide based on student interest.

But Menzel said the district has received preliminary student interest assessments and said there is enough student interest to offer at least one section of each of the current RCTC programs plus the additional construction trades course through WCC in the fall, though he noted staffing decisions still need to be finalized.

Holly Heaviland, director of community and school partnerships for the Washtenaw Intermediate School District, said final numbers won’t be known until guidance counselors meet to schedule students in July.

“We need to give the new staff time to come in and have those conversations with the kids to make those commitments,” she said.

Burnette, however, said interest in the RCTC programs is steady. He said last year, the center had about 60 students enrolled in its culinary arts and hospitality course, and about 30 each in the auto technician and auto collision courses. He said he’s received 124 applications for students interested in registering for RCTC programs next year.

Burnette said the RCTC also has had increasing support from outside the district. Dusty’s Collision founder Dusty Whitney pledged $75,000 over the course of three years to boost the RCTC auto center. Burnette said the auto center also has received another $5,000 donation that could be renewed for the next two or three years. He said the RCTC has received more than $16,000 in grants from the Collision Repair Education Foundation and is in the running for a $50,000 grant to renovate the auto shop.

“There is not another program in the state with this kind of support,” he said in an email.

The district’s partnership with WCC is part of its pledge that every YCS student should graduate with a career credential, college credit or both. Menzel said the district will be looking at establishing more electives through additional partnerships in the future.

Erica Hobbs is a freelancer for AnnArbor.com.