Diesel tech center fills training void

The lack of diesel engine mechanics in Louisiana is acute, said Cindy Poskey, dean of the Louisiana Technical College-Lafourche.

Responding to the need, SWDI (SWeeDee), the Houma-based trash-disposal company, which services all of Lafourche Parish, has renovated its former repair shop in Larose for use as a Diesel Technology Training Center.

The center is a new component of Louisiana Technical College-Lafourche, although the property is still owned by SWDI.

The college held a ribbon-cutting ceremony officially opening the center on June 29, which was attended by over 50 people and included a tour of the new facility.

The center has four students enrolled in its first class. Twenty-one students are committed for the fall.

Classes take place all year. The training program lasts four to five semesters, or 18 months to two years, and leads to a diploma in diesel technology equipment. Students do not graduate from the program with an associate’s degree, though the college hopes to award the degree in the future.

“It’s not there yet, but it’s something we want,” said Diesel Technology Instructor Fabian La Biche.

Students accumulate a series of certificates in different fields, like hydraulics and pneumatics, before gaining a Louisiana Technical College diploma, La Biche said.

All classes in the diesel engine training program take place at the facility in Larose. No classes are conducted at Louisiana Technical College campuses in Thibodaux and Galliano.

SWDI used its own money to pay to upgrade its former repair facility into the training center. The company began work in February 2007, after signing a financial memorandum with Louisiana Technical College, Poskey said.

The renovation was completed in two months.

SWDI is also paying the salaries of instructors at the training center.

Besides diesel engines for practice work, the center has a computer lab, pneumatic tools, tear-down equipment, a metal lathe, Caterpillars, bulldozers, tractors, and 18-wheelers.

SWDI donated a cherry picker, and some hand tools.

In addition, the company is prompting other businesses to donate tools, equipment, and supplies to the new training center.

“Mack has donated engines, and parts, and is going through their inventory to send equipment our way,” La Biche said. Another company has donated two engines.

Students are trained on marine, commercial, and industrial vehicles.

“There’s a constant shortage statewide of diesel mechanics in the maritime industry, and in the oil industry,” Poskey said. “Every (rig) you see on the road is diesel.”

Poskey met with SWDI General Manager Roddie Matherne in Oct. 2006. The two discussed Louisiana Technical College’s commercial vehicle program.

Matherne “expressed a dire need for diesel mechanics,” she said. “I told him we were aware of the need, but we didn’t have a site (to locate a training center). I told him I’d do what I could.”

Matherne then told Poskey that SWDI’s former repair facility in Larose was available.

La Biche drove home the shortage of diesel mechanics in Louisiana.

“I had one company tell me it would start one of our graduates out at $100,000,” he said. “One company tried to buy me away from being an instructor.”

He said he believes that one reason companies are donating equipment to the new training center is because they “want me to remember them so that we’ll send students their way.”

“It’s gotten so bad,” he said. “There’s not enough mechanics to go around. Well-versed, skilled mechanics are hard to come by.”

Part of the problem is the lure of computer fields.

“You need computer skills now” in diesel mechanics, La Biche said. “Young people say, ‘If I have to learn computers, I’ll stop (mechanical training) and take up computers.'”