Aerospace education gives students a chance to soar

“We have trained West Virginia residents from all four corners of the state,” Director Thomas Stose said. “We are always looking for more students to help with their training because we know once they start in this career field that ‘the sky is the limit.’ We are also always actively recruiting more women into our program.”

The industry needs the skilled, certified workers, Stose said. The female population is supported by the school through the Association for Women in Aviation Maintenance.

“We are members and have a chapter here at the school made up of students and representatives of our local aviation partners on the field,” he said.

The students have the opportunity to work through a 21-month program and become FAA certified once they pass all of their tests, Stose said. They work with partners in the aerospace community to make sure the courses they are maintaining are what the employers need.

In December, the center received a grant for over $1.7 million from the U.S. Economic Development Administration and the Appalachian Regional Commission. Stose said this grant will be used to upgrade training equipment.

“We want to upgrade the training standards we currently have in place. Part of the money will go to advanced avionic trainers,” he said. “We’ve been training on older jet engines, but with the grant we’re going to get six or seven Pratt & Whitney PT6s.”

The PT6 is an engine that’s overhauled at the local Pratt & Whitney location, located just down the hill from the education center. Stose said they will be working together to get the parts catalogs, manuals and sharing expertise with the students.

Another area Stose is working to improve for the students is to get some computers on wheels. The computers will hold all of the manuals for the different items the students work on.

“Right now, we have all of the physical manuals, but to get the computers on wheels the students can actually have next to them in the hangar while they are working, that’s an industry standard,” he said. “When they go to work after they leave here, that’s something they’ll have access to.”

The training the students receive sets them up for a career, not just a job.

“After over 20 years of training aviation maintenance technicians, we find that many of our graduates have grown in the field and now are managers at all of our aviation employers in different parts of the state,” he said. “Aviation is growing in West Virginia and will continue to expand with more companies finding a good state to grow a business is in West Virginia.”

Tracy Miller, president of the Mid-Atlantic Aerospace Complex, said with the Robert C. Byrd National Aerospace Education Center located at the North Central West Virginia Airport, it makes for the nucleus of the robust aerospace cluster.

“The training required in the aviation world of MRO companies — maintenance, repair and overhaul — is very specialized and must be FAA certified,” she said. “In order for our companies to maintain the necessary highly skilled and trained workforce they require, they must have access to niche aviation and aerospace training on a consistent basis.”

The two-year training program from Pierpont’s programs at the Robert C. Byrd National Aerospace Education Center program lead to a degree that gives graduates of the Aircraft Maintenance Technician programs a skill they will have for a lifetime, Miller said.

“The four-year programs from Fairmont State University provide a pilot training and four-year degrees in aviation administration, maintenance and flight,” she said. “Having the school located at our North Central West Virginia Airport, with direct access to our aerospace companies, is paramount to the success of helping the companies grow into the future.”

Miller said it also helps address the national and worldwide need for aircraft technicians and the need for more pilots.

North Central West Virginia Airport “will continue to grow our $1 billion plus economic impact and provide good jobs for our hard-working West Virginians, in large part because of the impact of having this school as our center hub of our aviation cluster,” she said.

Chuck Saffle, Lockheed Martin plant manager for Clarksburg, said when it comes to hiring employees, it’s a big benefit having the option of skilled workers.

“It makes a huge difference when you’re hiring to know they know how to use the aircraft tools and build aircrafts. It saves us on training,” he said. “With the background and skill sets they gain, it helps to speed up the training process.”

Lockheed has been instrumental in bringing certain specifications and requirements with sheetmetal and fastener installation to the Robert C. Byrd National Aerospace Education Center, Saffle said. It’s been a great benefit to be able to have input and influence on some of the classes.

“They have tremendous staff. Tom (Stose) is very well versed in aircrafts and goes above and beyond to get the right folks in the right positions for us,” Saffle said. “Having something like that local, people are able to go straight out of high school.”

It’s also a chance to keep local jobs in local plants, Saffle said, which is very important.

Daniel Smith, a graduate of the Robert C. Byrd National Aerospace Education Center, is an environmental health and safety mechanical engineer for Lockheed Martin. He said the education and experience he had at the center prepared him for his job today.

“The two biggest things I brought with me were the attention to detail and ability to work through codes, specifications and regulations and confidence, the ability to accomplish hard tasks,” he said. “They are really rare in the services provided, and for that kind of training you’d have to travel very far away without the school.”

The instructors are extremely knowledgable and experienced enough to be able to bring the outside world into West Virginia, Smith said. A lot of the programs are from direct communication with the local industry.

“They’ve tailored special programs for Lockheed Martin like sheet metal to train them instead of importing employees. It’s helping to employ the state, which I think is great,” he said. “They have such a strong team that’s invested in student success, and that builds confidence in those who go through the program. The instructors really help the students and care about them.”

Mike Gray, quality and training supervisor for Engine & Airframe Solutions Worldwide LLC, said their relationship with the school is extremely important. Each year they give the school grants for students who are graduating.

“Approximately 50 percent of our technicians have graduated from that school,” he said. “One was one of first employees; he worked his way up to supervisor and is now a part owner in the company.”

At Engine & Airframe Solutions Worldwide they are only able to hire licensed airframe and power plant mechanics, Gray said. The school provides them with trained and licensed personnel who can be brought on and put through training systems.

“They go through another year or two of training when they come to us from the school, but they all have the basic skills and legal requirements for the certifications,” he said. “They supply us with a well-trained, certificated workforce, and that’s important.”

The Robert C. Byrd Institute offers manufacturers with regional access to equipment and affordable workforce development and technical training programs, according to Mike Friel, public information specialist.

“In West Virginia, the aerospace industry is a bright spot that’s growing,” Friel said. “Companies are unable to find the workforce they need to innovate and grow. We are responding to those needs and want to do what we can to help.”

Apprenticeship work is one way they work to bridge the gap between the workforce and skills, Friel said. When companies are unable to find skilled workers, the Robert C. Byrd Institute can work to put in place an apprenticeship or training model to help develop a way to fill the needs.

Ralph Workman, director of the Robert C. Byrd Institute aerospace program, said they will be working to build upon their already robust partnerships to develop and sustain a proof-of-concept center in an area that’s prepared for it.

“From a training standpoint, we want to take the local workforce and create synergy with” the Robert C. Byrd National Aerospace Education Center, he said. “We would like to get displaced coal miners or current clients and get them involved with a four- or five-week course at (the Robert C. Byrd Institute) to get them familiar with machinist training ...”

Workman said he hopes that program will become functional in moving students from the Robert C. Byrd Institute to the Robert C. Byrd National Aerospace Education Center to become FAA certified. They offer work-based learning with related classroom training.