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Columbia Daily Tribune, Mo., Profile: Career And Technical Training column: Ready for the future
(Columbia Daily Tribune (Columbia, MO) (KRT) Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) Jul. 12--KANSAS CITY -- There is only one place where roaring table saws, cake pans, stethoscopes and high-tech animation software can be found together -- the national SkillsUSA Championships in Kansas City, where high school and post-secondary students gather each year to show off their vocational training.
About 5,000 student contestants filled several rooms of the vast Kansas City convention center complex June 21 to 27.
Their neat clothes reflected their future professions: ribbed chef's hats and crisp aprons for the culinary arts students, rugged Dickies pants and Caterpillar boots for the construction technology students; and white button-up shirts and thin black ties -- reminiscent of Best Buy's Geek Squad -- for computer engineering students.
The students competed in 91 contests that tested their competency in the skilled trades, technical sciences and leadership development.
This year, one theme was as clear as the protective glasses of the aspiring professionals: In the coming years, these students will be in higher demand and earn larger salaries than their colleagues with four-year degrees from traditional colleges.
The U.S. Department of Labor estimates that nine out of 10 of the fastest growing occupations in the country will require technical training. The department also reports that jobs in installation, maintenance and repair will increase by 550,000 by 2016. In that 9.3 percent growth, almost half of the new jobs come from the automotive service industry.
These trends have employers snatching up graduates with two-year technical degrees.
"America is facing a very difficult labor shortage despite what the economy looks like right now because the baby boomers are fixing to retire," said Tom Holdsworth, SkillsUSA director for communications and government relations. "People are beginning to realize the degree of sophistication" of the technical skills and training, "and the pay is equaling what they'll get with a four-year degree, and, frankly, there are a heck of a lot more opportunities on this side," he said.
Holdsworth said there has been a societal bias against technical professions and the students who train for them, with many people still believing only the less intelligent or less studious enroll in vocational programs. Despite this perception, he said, industries value the training and continue to demand a more highly skilled work force.
"The degree of sophistication for these jobs is growing, the pay is growing," Holdsworth said. "People are looking at what the needs of the country are -- the future for individuals that go" into technical training -- "and they are seeing them differently."
Vocational education has changed, too.
Mark Murphy has taught electronics applications at Mexico's Davis H. Hart Career Center for three decades. He said the focus of the career center's program has changed over that time.
"Now, it's career and technical education, and it's not just a name change," Murphy said. "Our programs have changed, the technology has changed. There's a tremendous amount of technical knowledge that goes into the programs, there's a tremendous amount of math and science in all of our programs."
"Murph's Men," as Murphy's students are known among some employers, placed in two contests at the SkillsUSA Championships in Kansas City -- engineering technology and electronics applications.
"He doesn't teach me, he gives me the tools to learn," said 18-year-old Shawn Creed, one of Murph's Men.
Creed was on a team of three students that worked for nine months to design wireless buzzers that could be marketed to schools for their quiz bowl competitions.
Creed's teammate Scott Booska, 18, added, "That's how I like to learn: hands-on."
Creed said he, Booska and teammate Matt Wieberg, 18, took notes during Murphy's lectures and then practiced with the tools, quickly finishing their assignments so they could get back to work on their SkillsUSA engineering project.
All three now plan to attend Linn State Technical College.
"It made me want to go to school because the class was so much fun," Creed said, beaming in his oversize white collared shirt and crooked tie.
The new approach of technical schools is appealing to many students who are bored or disinterested with the traditional classroom setting.
"Critical thinking skills are the most difficult things to teach those students," said Murphy, noting that students must know theory and draw on what they learn in several other subjects to complete tasks.
"We're about deepening the skill level and broadening the options in the career," said Arden Boyer-Stephens, director of the Columbia Area Career Center, which serves high school students from Hallsville, Ashland and Columbia. "There's the stigma that still exists that we only get the kids that don't go to college, and they don't earn as much as a person with a college degree, and that is a stereotype and a myth."
"It's not the knowledge of fixing things," said Karl Christopher, a trade and industry instructor at the Columbia Area Career Center. "It's the knowledge to creatively repair and make things better."
New technical careers still are emerging, especially as computer software becomes more complex and requires training before an entry-level employee can get a job.
For Caleb Chapman of Columbia, it was a love of playing video games that inspired him to learn software for creating 3-D and visual animation.
"It's used in movies, games, a lot of commercial ads ... anything 3-D and moving is where you're going to use it," Chapman said.
Boyer-Stephens said the career center uses publications, tours, videos and an upcoming Internet presentation to expose students to the opportunities in technical training. But, she said, parental approval is essential.
"Once a parent has a kid in one of these courses, we have amazing parental support," she said.
Parents and students consider the high cost of college, and many educators point out that technical schools often cost significantly less than four-year colleges. And many schools grant associate degrees so students can later pursue bachelor's degrees.
Greg Mosier, dean of career and technical education at Moberly Area Community College, said scholarship opportunities -- from schools and from potential employers -- are plentiful.
"The opportunity for people who have skills is tremendous ... and it's only going to grow in the coming years as society becomes more technically oriented," Mosier said.
"Everybody knows that nursing pays really well and IT pays really well, but a lot of people don't know that a well-trained machinist or a welder can make a ton of money. We get calls off and on for welders to work with pipe fitters' unions, and they're paying $70,000 to $90,000 a year."
Corey Hardin, 21, is a Columbia Area Career Center graduate and has an associate degree from Longview Community College in Lee's Summit.
He said by the time he finished school he had two years of experience in the automotive industry, and when he graduated from the General Motors Automotive Service Education Program, Perry Chevrolet hired him.
"You're always in demand," he said. "They're going to need technicians in this field forever, but you just have to learn and keep learning because we're going to go to hybrid, then hydrogen, then God knows what."
Nick Brothers, 28, took construction technology courses at the Columbia Area Career Center and got a job in the construction field.
But when he was laid off from that job, he had to take a low-skilled job with a heating, ventilation and air conditioning company.
Brothers saw potential in the HVAC field, so he went to Linn State for two years and earned his HVAC certification. Now, just two years out of Linn State, Brothers earns about $60,000 a year working for Air Systems LLC.
"I've never hired anybody who doesn't have that training," says Air Systems owner Jeff Squires, who recruits from Linn Tech because of the training students receive.
Brothers said he likes working with his hands troubleshooting electrical systems, and he says the field earns him a good salary with growth potential.
"People think, I can get a business degree and be a manger and make the beaucoup bucks' ... but just because you have that four-year degree doesn't necessarily mean you make more money," he said. "In this trade, a lot of people don't know that if you're a good technician, they'll call you."
Reach Abraham Mahshie at (573) 815-1733 or amahshie@tribmail.com.
To see more of the Columbia Daily Tribune, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.columbiatribune.com/.
Copyright (c) 2008, Columbia Daily Tribune, Mo.
Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.
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