What are some of the steps for becoming professional HVACR Tech? Before a individual can begin to practice in the profession, it is vital that you they receive as much HVACR training as possible and continue that training throughout their career. This means that individual get a formal education and training from an accredited vocational or technical school offering courses in the said field.

In most cases the contractor will require the applicant to have a high school diploma or a GED equivalent in order to become eligible to be hired. Fortunately, there are now plenty of HVAC training schools that are willing to help interested applicants to acquire the necessary skills and knowledge in order to become a licensed and certified HVAC technician. HVAC course programs vary in length and duration, which can range from as short as two semesters up to 2 years (for more comprehensive courses). It is vital that the individual enroll in accredited schools to ensure that they will be getting quality education.

The program will typically consist of general topics related to the field of heating, air-conditioning, and ventilation systems. These topics will lay the groundwork for a more specialized education by allowing the person to become familiar with the entire HVAC process. Once they have satisfied all the program requirements, the next thing to do is to find a good apprenticeship program to hone your skills further. In certain areas of the country, the individual may also participate in on-the-job training that are usually sponsored by the HVAC training schools. Gaining relevant experiences in the field is the best way to supplement the knowledge you’ve learned from school.

After earning your HVAC training certification and exposing themselves in formal field training, they can begin the next step to take the licensure and or certification exams to fully become a professional HVAC specialist!

Talented leaders in business, industry, and government are in your local area for help and advice. Do you have issues where you can't as an instructor have the local experts participate in your meeting? How about addressing your class to discuss the HVACR industry? What about having the budget for the instructors to go to instructor workshops?

Many HVACR Advisory boards have a mission statement written to explain in simple terms what the advisory board is there to do. In most of the mission statements, the primary functions of the board is to offer advice and perspective on education issues; to provide a link between the college and business, government, and educational institutions; and to serve as an advocate for the college in promoting academic programs and recruiting activities. Also, the board will help the college identify sources of external funding.

Having industry involved seems to have an edge on having the local contractors and other industry leaders become more involved with the advisory board. Due to budget concerns, needs for training material, equipment, student job placement, and training opportunities should be top priority for the board to consider during the meetings. If the instructor is having an issue due to the "budget," has the board ever made a reference in their minutes that the instructors also need to stay current with the changes in the industry? How about attending workshops such as the CARE Workshop?

"It is important to the college that they receive the advice and counsel of a group of individuals who are committed to excellence in the education of students and instructors. This is one of the reasons to have a select group of board members who can provide important perspectives on the needs for education in the present and in the future." 

Be Respectful of Your Colleagues

Probably the #1 practice for Bloggers is to be thoughtful and accurate in your posts, and be respectful of your other Bloggers. Since this is a public forum for our CARE members members of the CARE board can view and either post the comment to the blog or reject it. Just remember the courtesy head’s up is always appreciated.

Freon is being phased out this year, but that doesn't mean that customers have to stop using R-22. According to The Dallas Morning News , some homeowners are confused about the phase-out and what kind of refrigerant they can still use.
To read more: http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/fea/home/stories/DN-lbh_acfreon_0412gd.ART.State.Edition1.4c6ff83.html

During these times it is very important to remember that the trade/technical careers your students have chosen will give the individual a wide choice of opportunities in the field they have chosen. A career in the heating, ventilation, air conditioning, refrigeration and plumbing can be very rewarding to the individual. There are various jobs & locations throughout the country that has the "Help Wanted" sign out, even in these economic down times. A building that has HVACR controls, equipment, IAQ, or plumbing inside it needs one of your trade technicians to service, monitor, install, or maintain those items. Good Training!! Harold Nelson

The CARE Board is dedicated to you the members, working diligently to provide you with the resources your programs need to meet the needs of a very demanding industry.

What are your needs and what do you think about what you are seeing?

Let us hear from you.

 

Joel

http://www.carehvacr.org/board.htm

Putting UDL (Universal Design Learning) to work.

 

I have a student that has a learning disability. We have employed a number of strategies that help him read and comprehend material. The one area where he struggled was taking exams. He would miss read a question thus reply with an incorrect answer. Because he worked so hard to read and understand the questions he would have more problems toward the end of the exam. Working with the student we came up with a solution. I now put his exams in PowerPoint. We picked a background color, type color and font type that works best for him. Each question comes up with a click of the mouse. Using one of the PowerPoint options, I record reading each question. So the student not only can read the question he can have it read to him as many time as he would like. He answers the question on a separate sheet and move on to the next question. He does not get overwhelmed with the length of the exam. As he opens a page he only see one question at a time. I found you can place three questions on a slide.  His exams scores have really improved and his test anxiety had diminished.

 

After doing the first exam, which took some time to set up, I used it as a template. Now I just cut and past the question into the existing text box, record the question and move to the next one. It take approximately thirty for forty five minutes to do an exam. I then burn it to a CD. When the student is ready, I give him the CD and he is on the way to successfully completing another exam.

The economy is causing cuts at all of our schools. What type of cuts have been made in your program that make it more difficult to deliver training. If we can identify some of the problems, one of our fellow members may be able to come up with a solution.

"Advancing Green Mechanical Concepts" is the theme for the
March 24-26, 2010 HVACR and Plumbing Instructor's Workshop.

The 2010 workshop will be held at National Convention Center in Lansdowne, VA again. Start making your plans to attend, we are expecting this to be the best year yet.

Check back often as we will keep things up to-date as they are made available. Be sure to checkout the Residential Mechanical Ventilation blog.

The Residential Mechanical Ventilation Train-the-Train on March 22-23, 2010 is an excellent opportunity to learn about the application, design, installation and testing of mechanical ventilation. 

We encourage as many as can to attend this offering. For more information visit http://www.hrai.ca/site/skilltech/UStraining.html