The Next Generation
With a new year upon us, it’s a good time to celebrate things new. New challenges, new technologies, and new customers. It’s especially gratifying to see new people interested in the engineering and design professions. Our business and our country need the next generation of engineers and technicians to bring the next generation of ideas to life. Those ideas are critically important to keeping our industries productive and competitive and healthy.
Pictured above left is Edgar, an engineering student intern who is back to work on a project over his Christmas break. Edgar is helping us complete an engineering study for a customer that has an end-of-year deadline.
To the right is Tyler, Al Glover’s son, who is a high school junior. He’s interested in a technical career, and wanted to spend a day with us seeing what a day in the life of an engineer is like.
Tyler got a chance to talk with Edgar about school, internships, and what made him decide on an engineering career path. Tyler also got a chance to talk with our Jimmy Skadal about what its like for an engineer new to the field, and what engineering means to him.
It wasn’t all talk for Tyler, however. I put him to work on a solar photovoltaic project I was quoting. Tyler got a chance to learn how a solar panel works, how the different parts of a system go together, and how size a system to deliver the amount of energy this customer needs.
And we topped off this work by looking at the economics of a solar project for this particular customer. In this case, the customer will earn a 7% per year return on his investment, pretty handsome when you consider this is a conservative investment, and the returns are not taxed.
Whatever Tyler chooses for a career, hopefully the day was beneficial for him to learn what maybe he likes or doesn’t like about engineering work. If he chooses an engineering path or an electrician path, both careers are rewarding, do good things for our world, and he can make a good living. We wish him the best in his career choices.
And we wish Edgar the best in his future studies, and the light of a job at the end of his engineering school tunnel!
Ken Deering
12/28/15