The sun is one of California's greatest assets and a new class at Mt. San Jacinto College will help students tap into it.
The course, titled "Renewable Energy: Photovoltaic Employment Training," will teach students to design, build and install solar panel systems, said Mark Hedges, who will teach the class.
Each student has a different reason for taking the class.
"The younger group, they're into the green movement. The older students, they need an industry that's going to carry them for the next 15 year," said Hedges, the president of UManageIt & Associates.
Students completing the 80-hour course will receive a certificate of knowledge.
The class is based on curriculum designed by the North American Board of Certified Energy Practitioners, an organization that aims to standardize renewable energy credentialing programs, Hedges said.
Kazen Sharifan, a Temecula resident and one of nine students in the course, said he wants to help people be energy independent.
That reason brought him to the United States from Iran in 1976. He came to learn how to run Iran's then-newly nationalized oil industry, he recalled.
Then the Islamic Revolution happened, and he decided to stay in the U.S. Now, he wants to rid the U.S. of its dependence on his former home's oil, he said.
"When I see somebody in a big SUV pumping gas, I just want to grab the nozzle," Sharifan said.
Other students hope to help the environment.
"We need to do it for ourselves, for the planet, for the future," said Fernando Cortez, a student from Menifee.
Cortez, who likes nature and hiking, said he has "always been green-minded."
He has a hybrid car and has a solar panel system on his 1,400-square-foot home.
Cortez said he has paid nothing for electricity since he put 32 photovoltaic panels on his roof.
"I know it works. It's 100 percent viable," he said.
Hedges agreed.
"For Californians, for us, it's a hot industry -- no pun intended -- but we got great sun," he said. "We're wasting one of our greatest resources."
Hedges, a retired Navy construction battalion chief, has been teaching classes on renewable energy for private companies and Riverside Community College for the last two years. He got involved in the business five years ago.
The class will meet twice a week for four hours at 6 p.m. and finish with a daylong field trip to a solar panel project site. The field trip will not only let students see what they learned in use, but it will help them make connections.
"A lot of them, because of the reputation we have and because of the site visits, the contractors will ask for a resume and (students) go to work for them," Hedges said.
The teacher's goal is to help students create resumes highlighting their skills with renewable energy technology.
Not only are designers and installers in demand, but other contractors with knowledge of renewable energy technologies are too, Hedges said.
"Like any business, it has a ripple effect," he said.
Chris Smith, a Moreno Valley contractor and a student in the class, is counting on the demand to help him get work.
"In California, you can't find a job with anything right now," he said.
Smith said he thinks renewable energy has a promising future and he hopes to be part of it.
"I don't want a job," he said. "I want a career."
© 2010 [Subscriber] and its licensors.
Portions © 20010 Bring the Blog,
LLC and used with permission.
All rights reserved.
Do not reproduce without permission.
No comments:
Post a Comment