ITHACA — GEI Consultants, Inc. recently renewed its lease of 3,708 square feet of office space at 1301 Trumansburg Road in Ithaca. 

Rick Searles and Brian Tennant, of CBRE/Syracuse, and Alex Plaisted, of CBRE/New England, represented GEI, according to a CBRE news release. Lease terms were not disclosed.

GEI Consultants says it is a consulting engineering and environmental firm with more than 800 staff and 38 offices nationwide. The firm’s other upstate New York office is in Amherst, near Buffalo.

GEI, which is employee-owned, provides engineering and technical services to a range of private and public-sector clients domestically and abroad. The firm was founded in 1970. 

ONEONTA — Hartwick College recently announced it has formed a partnership with the Peace Corps, establishing New York state’s first college-level preparatory program. 

The Hartwick Peace Corps Preparatory Program will prepare interested Hartwick students for careers or volunteer service abroad. Students from all majors are eligible to participate, and earn a certificate from one of only a few dozen such higher-education curricula nationwide.

New York state has 449 residents currently serving overseas, making it the Peace Corps’ second highest volunteer-producing state, according to a Hartwick news release. Five Hartwick alumni are currently in the Peace Corps, serving in Rwanda, Senegal, Morocco, Swaziland, and Uganda, and 110 Hartwick alumni have served since the Peace Corps was founded in 1961.

In providing coursework that mimics the training that Peace Corps volunteers receive before serving abroad, the program allows students to develop skills and gain experiences that will make them more competitive when applying to volunteer with the Peace Corps or positions with international development organizations, the college said.

The Hartwick Peace Corps Preparatory Program will help students develop specific skills in areas important to this type of work, by providing:

• Training and experience in one of six work sectors (education, health, environment, agriculture, youth in development, or community economic development)

• Foreign-language skills

• Intercultural competence

• Professional and leadership development

The program has no specially designed courses. Students can earn the certificate by enrolling in pre-selected coursework already given at the college, the release stated. Some students may already have taken all the required courses.

The program will be administered by Hartwick’s Center for Professional, Service, and Global Engagement, and managed by a team of staff and faculty and supported by advisers from several academic departments.

Godlove Fonjweng, Hartwick’s director of global education & service learning, will serve as the program director.

Students who complete the program will be issued a certificate signed by the acting director of the Peace Corps in Washington, D.C.

The program formally launched on Nov. 1, with a ceremony on the Hartwick campus.