College house calls ease job training
Workers gain skills through classes conducted at plants and businesses in Northeastern Pa.
WILKES-BARRE - The constant evolution of technology means mechanic Roger Baer always has something new to learn.
"Everything changes," said Baer, who maintains machines at the Fabri-Kal facility in Mountain Top. "You have to be able to read [schematics] and know electricity, electronics, motor controls, hydraulics."
The problem is that finding time to attend courses at a college campus is always difficult for full-time career workers. It got a lot easier for Baer when Luzerne County Community College came to his workplace to offer training that fit the company's shifts.
"It was good of them to come out to the plant," said Dave Bayer, a print team leader for Fabri-Kal's Hazleton plant, which manufactures food containers. "We work on a 12-hour schedule, which flip-flops from week to week. So we couldn't go to school every Wednesday night. They came on-site to accommodate our schedule."
This is how LCCC has secured a niche giving everyday workers practical educations. It has trained about 2,000 employees per year for Northeastern Pennsylvania business and industry in the nine years since it went on the road to teach workers on-site.
The college has held about 130 training programs each year in the seven counties it serves: Luzerne, Lackawanna, Wyoming, Susquehanna, Wayne, Columbia and Northumberland.
The training has proved valuable to workers such as Baer.
"In the classroom environment, you can tear something apart," he said. "You can't do that on the job. It can be dangerous if you don't fully understand. If they offered the course again, I'd take it without hesitation."
Typically, each program trains 15 workers. So 130 programs a year in the seven-county area train about 2,000. Multiply those numbers by nine years, and you get 18,000 workers with new skills.
David Sawicki, director of LCCC's Center for Business Solutions, said his office is a one-stop place for a business to get all the help it needs.
"LCCC provides training, consulting and problem-solving. All a business representative has to do is make one phone call [to LCCC], and LCCC takes care of the rest," he said.
And the program gives the businesses the most bang for their training buck by customizing the program for the particular business or industry, so they get exactly what they need.
In addition to Fabri-Kal, LCCC has provided training programs for some of the area's largest employers. They include Wyoming Valley Health Care System, Geisinger Health System, the Social Security Administration, the Hazleton Area School District, the Greater Hazleton Health Alliance, Cargill Meat Solutions, OfficeMax, First Quality Non-Wovens, Dial, Temple-Inland, Simmons, and Hilton Worldwide Reservations.
Mike Wolfkyle, of Wyoming Valley Health Care System, said the system used a program to train different groups of its workers to speak Spanish.
"We are trying to prepare for the influx of people with limited English proficiency," Wolfkyle said. "We investigated the options and found the LCCC program."
Wolfkyle said LCCC customized the program to the system's needs.
"They [LCCC personnel] came here and ran several sessions of their Command Spanish course," Wolfkyle said. "In 18 months, we've trained 90 people," Wolfkyle said. "The course teaches, phonetically, the stuff they need to know. For something complex like explaining a colonoscopy, we use a translator. But to ask someone where it hurts, or a dietary question, this Spanish works well."
Wolfkyle said the course teaches more than language. Additional material provides a better understanding of the Spanish-speaking people to whom employees are trying to relate.