May 28, 2007

Trades Training

Operator trainees get the basics with new program

Peter Mitham

correspondent

Operators of heavy equipment will get a credible course of training with a new program that recently finished its pilot run on Vancouver Island and in Maple Ridge.

Delivered by Malaspina University College and the International Union of Operating Engineers, the heavy equipment operator apprentice program attracted 32 students in its inaugural run. The four-week course provided participants with one week of class work and three weeks of practical experience.

Backed by the Industry Training Authority, the program has a credibility that on-the-job training just doesn’t have, said Kent Orrock, human resources program manager for the B.C. Road Builders and Heavy Construction Association.

Those who complete the program are qualified entry-level operators.

Malaspina and the IUOE were chosen to deliver the program because they have the equipment and the space needed for the program, which trains participants to work on articulated hauling trucks, backhoes, excavators, bulldozers, graders and loaders.

Most employers don’t have the resources to devote to training on this scale.

Master Promotions Ltd.

Excavators on display in the Demo Zone at the 2005 Heavy Construction Show held at the Tradex in Abbotsford.

“The investment it takes is just too onerous for most employers,” Orrock said. “It’s so capital intensive.”

Jim Andersen, the program’s instructor at Malaspina University College in Nanaimo, had a hand in developing the program on contract through the Stonecoast Group.

Malaspina had a regular program that was heavy on experience, but it didn’t include much theory. It was a step above on-the-job training, but the new program is a significant leap forward because it provides an effective combination of theory and practice.

The content, developed in consultation with major industry players such as JJM Construction Ltd. and Mainroad Contracting Ltd., aims to provide a thorough grounding in safety, maintenance and monitoring of machinery, basic heavy equipment knowledge and an introduction to civil engineering principles.

“As an instructor, it’s great to actually have that kind of material in front of us that a lot of thought’s gone into,” he said. “We have a blueprint for instruction that we lacked before.”

Assessment is based on competence at the end, not just hours logged. Participants write an exam as well as complete a practical test.

The apprenticeship program for operators follows on the introduction last year of the Foundation program. Just short of 100 participants have taken that course, which lasts four weeks.

Delivered by the IUOE and select colleges, the Foundation program may become a formal prerequisite for the heavy equipment operators’ course because of the improvement it’s made in participants.

“People who went through the Foundation program were so much more knowledgeable about the industry than those who had actually been in the industry for a year,” Orrock said of program graduates who went on to participate in the heavy equipment course. “We’ve had really good feedback from the employers about the Foundation (program) as well. They’re really impressed.”

Orrock said the next offering of the Foundation program through the IUOE has a full complement of 32 students.

Print | Email | Comment