Victor Valley College began the new year with a five-day training on hybrid and electric vehicles for nearly a dozen high school and community college instructors.
The training was held at Victor Valley College January 2-6 and included a mix of online, classroom and hands-on instruction to help instructors build on their existing skillsets and work effectively with their students in the coming year.
“As most instructors are previous technicians with electrical (not electronics) training and experience, this training allowed us to gain an understanding of the complicated control systems involved in alternative propulsion vehicles,” said Steven Coultas, the event’s organizer and an automotive instructor at Victor Valley College.
The group’s instructor was Mark Quarto of FutureTech, an automotive training organization specializing in alternative fuel vehicles. Quarto is an electrical engineer who retired from GM after 28 years of working on electric vehicles.
“I’m pleased and honored to be a small part of the program’s success but, more excited to see the growth of the instructors throughout the week of training,” Quarto said. “The group was super-engaged, and the facility was a fantastic venue for the event.”
Beau Sunahara, an automotive instructor at Duncan Polytechnical High School, attended the training to help his students make the most of the resources provided by the CEC Clean Fuels Pilot Program.
“It was amazing, the instructor was so knowledgeable and explained everything from a technician perspective rather than an engineer’s perspective, so it was easily understandable,” Sunahara said.
Funding for the training came from the Strong Workforce Regional Funding. Coultas said it did not fit into Victor Valley’s budget and would not have been possible without the additional support.
“This funding was part of a larger Strong Workforce project to get EV instruction into our region’s automotive programs,” said Larry McLaughlin, ATL Regional Director for the Inland Empire/Desert Region.
Though the price tag was high, Coultas said it was worth every penny for the quality of hands-on instruction and the follow-up materials made available to attendees to reference back in their classrooms.
“Each day built on the previous and the level of information presented daily was at a technical level well above my previous knowledge base; I was truly expended to the maximum of my learning capacity at the end of each day,” Coultas said. “I feel that this training had the most value to me above any other that I have previously attended.”
