(By Matt Pedigo, The Citizen-Times, October 4, 2018, Used with Permission)
Students at the Allen County Career and Technical Center (ACCTC) have yet another new opportunity: Paid, full apprenticeship with an area industry.
With its 160,000 square-foot plant located in Bowling Green’s Kentucky Transpark, Cannon Automotive Solutions makes—through hot and cold-stamping as well as laser cutting—metal components for the automotive industry. And soon Allen County students will begin to learn how, first-hand.
“This is a wonderful opportunity for the school and our students,” ACCTC Principal Joseph Cosby said.
A personal connection with Cannon Automotive Solutions Operations Manager Ray Ouellette—who has a student at ACCTC—led to a tour of the new multi-discipline technical school at Allen County-Scottsville High School.
Ouellette, who also leads Cannon’s outreach programs, saw the mutual potential of offering the Cannon opportunity to ACCTC students, and Cannon decided to partner with ACCTC in a Kentucky Department of Education-approved Tech Ready Apprentices for Careers in Kentucky (TRACK) program. The TRACK program, named last year by the US Department of Education as the nation’s top best practice youth apprenticeship model, covers apprenticeships in areas ranging from agriculture to health sciences to manufacturing and marketing. Many TRACK program students are gaining employment with little or no student loan debt.
The ACCTC/Cannon program would begin with instructor Matt Keith’s welding courses, Instructor Paul Spears/ Industrial Maintenance courses and Dolorse Rice’s Computer-Aided Drafting courses. Other ACCTC programs could also become involved as the apprenticeship progresses.
Cosby noted that Cannon offers a choice of the three weekday shifts or a weekend shift for its apprentices, and has designed the apprenticeship hours to be flexible so as to meet student needs.
“They understand the students’ needs for school, like testing,” he said.
Prior to this, the closest thing ACCTC had to an apprenticeship program was the Western Kentucky University SKyTEACH program, which is done in partnership with Sumitomo Electric Wiring Systems. However, it requires students to be at least 18 years of age, so most are either freshly out of school or approaching graduation. The Cannon/TRACK program is open to high school students under age 18.
Cosby said the Cannon apprenticeship also differs in that it does not come with any requirements for the student to work for Cannon later. The students can work at Cannon and learn, then work anywhere in their career field. Cannon, Cosby said, has taken the position of wanting to help build a regional workforce ready to meet the needs of all existing and incoming companies—a “rising tide lifts all boats” philosophy.
Some of those current or future companies could be satellite industries or suppliers that meet Cannon’s needs, therefore helping Cannon keep its operations going efficiently in this region.
In terms of liability concerns, TRACK is considered an extension of school, and students are covered under their schools’ policies.
Cosby said ACCTC is forming a committee—including himself, Career Counselor Laura Carter and other ACCTC educators—to help select students for the Cannon program. The process will include the company’s human resources administrators as well, so students will also gain interview and job-seeking experience.
“We want to get good quality students, who will put forth the effort to get a good job,” Cosby said.