Adults, youths to share courses

If trends reverse, the adult-only course could restart, a district administrator said.
By JoANNE VIVIANO
VINDICATOR EDUCATION WRITER
YOUNGSTOWN -- Joe Ward of Youngstown is learning a new trade.
He hopes he'll make the $1,000 per week he made before he was laid off, but said he fears he won't find the type of job for which he had hoped.
Ward is a student in the Youngstown city school district's Adult Precision Machine Trades course and hopes to earn a certificate in February.
Financial concerns mean the district is consolidating the adult program with a high school program and, as of Sept. 1, the adults will have new class hours, a new teacher and new, younger classmates.
"When we first signed up, we were promised certain things," Ward said "With the changes, that won't happen."
Ward isn't sure that he'll receive the same attention if he's in a class with youngsters, and he wonders if his new teacher will have the same job-placement abilities as current instructor George C. Kovach Sr.
Kovach, who has associate and bachelor's degrees and journeyman's papers, worked for 13 years in the industry before becoming a teacher 14 years ago. Kovach said the program at the Choffin Career & amp; Technical Center has found jobs for 94 percent of its students, who earn an average of $14 per hour to start.
Suspended contract
The district's board voted in April to suspend Kovach's teaching contract as a result of the program's enrollment drops.
But that doesn't mean students have nowhere to go, said Ron Schulay, the district's director of career, technical and adult education. He said adults who want to take the program can continue to do so, but it is offered in a different format.
"We'll continue to run the program as long as there's demand," he said. "The demand is very weak. It has been for three years."
Combining adults with high school students is "nothing new," he said and, is done in other technical schools.
District adult programs must be self-sufficient and, per district-teacher union contract, they face cancellation if they lose money over two or more consecutive years, Schulay said. He said the machining program has been in the red for three years.
"Manufacturing in the Valley is way down. Research tells us demand in this skill is weak," Schulay said. If trends reverse, however, the adult program could be restarted as a separate course, he added.
Kovach teaches students to operate and program Computer Numerical Control (CNC) machines -- equipment that is run by a computer and accurate to more than one-thousandth of an inch.
About the program
During the 180-day program, students learn machining, blueprint reading, math that includes algebra, geometry, trigonometry and some calculus, and "geometric dimensioning and tolerancing" -- an international programming language using geometric symbols.
Students must have a completed a General Educational Development test or high school diploma to enroll and they leave with a certificate from the school district and from CNC Concepts in Chicago.
Kovach said he needed to recruit eight new students into the program to break even in the coming year. So far, he's found five but was hopeful he'd find three more before September. He said strict attendance and admissions policies may have caused some adults to steer away from the course.
"What are these people going to do? That's my question," said Todd Diehl, owner of Premier Hydraulics in Farrell, Pa.
Diehl said there is absolutely a need for these types of programs and that jobs are out there. In the Sharon-Farrell-Hermitage area, he said, there are five CNC shops and Cleveland-area newspaper classified ads often seek CNC operators and programmers.
"There's a need for training everywhere in the trades, but everybody seems to be giving up on it," he said. "I think it's a trend. No one wants to put money into these schools to train people on the industrial side."
As a result, Diehl said, he trains his own workers, up to 20 at a time.
The company employs 85 to 100 workers and it has hired students from Choffin's adult program. All came in with proper training and are "very productive," Diehl said.
Still, Diehl admitted, the manufacturing industry is losing ground. While it once made up nearly 70 percent of the U.S. economy, it now makes up slightly more than 30 percent, he said.
Found jobs
David Ruck of Austintown was laid off and working at Wal-Mart when he joined the program at Choffin. Shortly after, he started working for Diehl.
"They [employers] won't hire you without the CNC experience," he said. "Jobs are out there. You just need to have the higher level of experience and the skills."
Frank Losiewicz of Poland came to Choffin after being laid off from Cold Metal Products. "With the way things are going, with the mills closing down, people need some kind of avenue to go down," he said.
Kovach said it costs about $94,000 per year to pay for the program, but the $4,500-per-student tuitions and state support based on enrollment haven't been enough in recent years. But before the last three years, the program often made money, sometimes as much as $60,000 to $80,000 per year, Kovach said.
He maintains that there remains a need for skilled trades, especially in the CNC area, where employers routinely call him looking for workers.
And he's received Christmas cards from families of students who've found work. One said: "Thanks. This is the first Christmas we've had in 10 years."
"Anyone who wants to support a family and doesn't want to go to college needs training like this," he said. "I don't care if we lose $20,000 a year. If I can take six or 10 guys and get them out where they can support themselves and get off welfare rolls, it's worth it."
viviano@vindy.com