Editor’s note: The following article was published in July in Kellogg Community College’s Summer 2012 edition of CareerFocus magazine with the headline, “Driving CADD forward: Community partners advise KCC on industry needs.”
The Computer-Aided Drafting and Design Technology Program at Kellogg Community College is on the leading edge of providing students instruction in the types of skills that CADD employers are looking for, and instructor Douglas Mann gives much of the credit to the community partners that make up the college’s CADD Advisory Committee.
The advisory committee drives the program forward, Mann said, letting the college know the needs of the community and how the program can incorporate new tools and learning opportunities to help their students to be able to fulfill those needs upon graduation.
Douglas Cook, a product engineer at Hi-Lex America and a member of the advisory committee, said the college has been very receptive to the committee’s insights.
“They like to hear what’s going on out here,” Cook said. “They listen to what we have and what’s going on, what might be needed and how to further develop their program. They do a good job.”
Cook said that he used to work on the floor at Hi-Lex before taking CADD classes at KCC himself, after which he was able to work his way up to the position he holds now. The company also has a part-time drafter/designer currently on staff who’s still attending KCC, he said.
“He’s still in college, he’s still going there,” Cook said. “He came right from there and is putting his skills to use.”
John Moffett, an engineer at Duncan Aviation and another member of the CADD Advisory Committee, said he works with two adults who are currently working through KCC’s CADD program, taking classes as they can.
Moffett graduated from the program in the early 1990s.
“I’ve used every class I’ve taken out of that program, and I’ve applied it either to this career or previous jobs,” Moffett said. “So it’s been really helpful. … KCC is an excellent place cost wise and flexibility wise to get started at.”
Pictured above, KCC CADD professor Douglass Mann stands in one of the College’s CADD labs. For more information about Kellogg Community College’s CADD Program, visit www.kellogg.edu/academics/academic-programs/information-technology/computer-aided-drafting-design-cadd.