Students seeking a hands-on way to launch careers in a cutting-edge industry have a new opportunity in Northern Kentucky.
Gateway Technical and Community College in Covington now offers an associate in applied science degree in energy technologies, and energy careers program coordinator Yvonne Meichtry says the new degrees, which focus on high-tech topics such as smart grid technology, renewable energy and efficiency auditing, are responding to market demand.
Meichtry says the college was approached by a number of local utility contractors, such as the
Bowlin Group LLC and
Duke Energy, with a pressing need: More than half of the utilities trades workforce is expected to hit retirement age over the next five years, and employers need a resource that produces graduates who can hit the ground running in jobs as linemen and technicians.
"They wanted [the students] to have a basic level of skills when they walked in the door," she says. While the companies would have trained new-hires from the ground up in the past, energy technology advances make a higher degree of pre-employment training much more attractive.
Students in the associate in applied science degree can choose to focus on one of six specialty areas: Energy Utility Technician (Lineperson), Outside Plant Technician, Energy Efficiency Electrical Controls Technician, Energy Efficiency and Analysis, Solar/Photovoltaic Technologies, and Wind Systems Technologies. The program also offers students the chance to earn a number of industry certifications.
"Employers really value these," Meichtry says. "We're currently working on having students get qualified for certifications."
The program is supported in part by a three-year, $350,000 Department of Labor grant, and leverages the college's existing electrical trades degree programs, Meichtry says.
"We were able to pull from programs that already exist" for a number of the degree's core classes, she says. The difference, she explains, is in the technology. "[The new program] prepares students for the cutting edge, especially with green engineering."
The move seems to be paying off. Meichtry says the college currently has a 75 percent placement rate of graduates into the industry. And with the new program fully online this fall, she expects that positive trend to continue.
"The hiring seems to be picking up," she says.
By Matt Cunningham
Follow Matt on Twitter @cunningcontent
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