Florida State College at Jacksonville (FSCJ) is pleased to announce the appointment of Dr. George “Fred” Fredrick, U.S. Army Retired as Executive Director of Military Affairs & Veteran Services. 

In this role, Dr. Fredrick will lead FSCJ's Military Affairs & Veteran Services division, advancing the College's commitment to student success, access and excellence for our over 3,000 active-duty military personnel, veterans and military-connected students utilizing educational benefits.

Dr. Fredrick joins FSCJ following a distinguished career spanning military service and higher education leadership. Beginning his military career as an enlisted Soldier, he later earned his commission through Army ROTC and served more than 23 years as an Infantry Officer, rising to the rank of Colonel. A combat veteran, he has demonstrated a lifelong commitment to leadership, service and developing others.

"Fred is a thoughtful and accomplished leader whose commitment to students, service and continuous improvement aligns strongly with FSCJ's mission," said College President John Avendano, Ph.D. "His extensive military and higher education experience, combined with his passion for supporting those who have served our nation, will further strengthen FSCJ's ability to meet the unique needs of military-connected students. We are excited to welcome him to the FSCJ family."

Elliott Strickland, Vice President of Student Affairs & Enrollment Management, expressed enthusiasm about Dr. Fredrick's addition to the College.

"Fred brings an extraordinary combination of leadership, expertise and a genuine dedication to student success," said Strickland. "He understands the challenges and opportunities facing military-connected students because he has lived them and led through them.”

His higher education experience includes serving as a Professor of Military Science and leading the Recruiting Operations Office for the U.S. Army Cadet Command's 6th Brigade. Most recently, he served as Director of Veteran & Military Services at Georgia Southern University, where he also advised the university's executive leadership team on military and veteran affairs.

Learn more about our Military Affairs and Veteran Services Department at fscj.edu/mvsc.

By Mauricio La Plante – Reporter, Jacksonville Business Journal
Sep 30, 2026

Updated Sep 30, 2026 2:51pm EDT

After CSX⁠ opened its hazardous materials training facility in partnership with Florida State College at Jacksonville earlier this year, the Class I railroad is planning to open a second training facility in the city next year.

At a tour of its newly launched hazmat training center at the Fire Academy of the South within the FSCJ⁠ South Campus, CSX officials told the Business Journal that the second facility, planned at Moncrief Yard in the Northside, is set to complement the college site.

Whereas the FSCJ facility has train cars upright on tracks for fire rescue recruits and students to assess damage and respond to practice drills for high-risk chemical vapor and fluid leaks, the derailment training facility will expose trainees to a simulation of the most severe scenario a rail line can have.

The idea behind it is instructors at the CSX site will bring trainees to the rail yard where a simulated derailment will be strewn across a section of in the yard, said Sean Reid, manager of emergency preparedness and training at CSX, and have them take the lessons learned at FSCJ and apply that knowledge to a derailment incident.

It's basically going to be “walking into an unknown” for first responders and contractors in training, Reid said.

CSX officials are targeting an opening of the new facility in the second or third quarter of 2027.

On the Southside, the facility at the FSCJ's fire academy was completed in Spring 2026 and hosted its first external training in June 2026, a CSX spokesperson said.

Joseph Taylor, director of hazmat at CSX said the FSCJ facility is uniquely tailored for trainees to be exposed to multiple train car types. Hazardous chemicals are not always in the same type of container being pulled by a locomotive. Some are in tanker cars. Others are in hopper cars.

CSX has lined up a variety of trains that were decommissioned because of accidents or taken from its mobile training locomotives for firefighters and students across its network.

Joseph Taylor, director of hazmat at CSX, shows hatch devices built for training emergency responders to use during hazmat leak incidents.

The vast array of cars is not only essential in training emergency responders how to seal a leak, but also to identify what they're encountering.

Set-ups also include mobile hatches for trainees to learn how to seal leaks and drones to analyze hazmat incident sites.

Prior to the construction of its facility at FSCJ, CSX had a site in Atlanta that was decommissioned in 2017.

The Fortune 500 company was considering other sites across the Eastern Seaboard, including locations in Tennessee and Virginia. What set Jacksonville apart was FSCJ, Taylor said.

"What's unique about us is that you've got a Class I railroad that's partnered with an academic institute to create this," Taylor said.

A spokesperson for FSCJ told the Business Journal that the Fire Academy of the South has not done any training classes at the new CSX training facility since its opening, but CSX has conducted one class consisting of about 30 participants.

Additional work and the installation of more props is slated for the training facility, and FSCJ's fire academy plans to offer specialized courses to emergency responders in the Jacksonville area to prepare them in responding to railcar incidents.

Once all work on the facility is complete, FSCJ will collaborate with CSX to schedule the training when the facility is available.