LARAMIE — Shayna Rodrigues grew up in a family full of boys in Hawaii. As a result, her childhood was full of fixing vehicles of all kinds. She can’t even remember the first time she looked under the hood of a car or truck.
“My uncle had a tow truck company,” she told Cowboy State Daily. “And so, I was fixing his tow truck a lot.”
It didn’t take her long to realize that she didn’t just want to fix cars and trucks. She wanted to fix the biggest vehicles.
“I wanted to go bigger and better,” she said. “Make my mark on the world.”
That outsized desire to do something big with her life is what brought her to the diesel mechanic program at WyoTech in Wyoming.
She found out this week that the program she’d chosen to level up her own life is itself leveling up — giving her even more opportunities to make that mark on the world that she’s dreaming about.
Laramie-based trade school WyoTech on Thursday unveiled an expansion of its diesel mechanic program with partner Kenworth Trucks. It’s a partnership that includes a $2 million lineup of custom-built trucks created just for WyoTech’s program.
Each of the trucks has the very latest bells and whistles, according to Kenworth Technical School Program Manager Darren Erickson, and the trucks will be updated on a regular basis for a diesel mechanic program that Erickson said was already best in class, in his opinion.
“This truck has all the latest technology that we offer our customers,” he told Cowboy State Daily. “Essentially, all the systems that would be required for a truck to be self-driving are on this truck. There is forward-looking radar, forward-looking cameras, side cameras, radar systems, torque overlay steering so the truck holds its lane. And all of those systems talk to each other.”
It’s that talking to each other that poses a challenge. It means finding lots of diesel mechanics who are comfortable high-tech equipment. But so far, Kenworth has faced a huge shortage when it comes to diesel mechanics with the right training.
“We need probably between 30,000 to 40,000 diesel mechanics per year,” Erickson said. “Schools (in America) are only graduating between 8,000 to 11,000.”
Salaries for these jobs, meanwhile, can easily reach six figures within a couple of years, Erickson said.
That means this is a sector that’s a wide-open field of opportunity, with exponential growth and high salaries for those willing to go above and beyond with their training.
Ongoing Upgrades
It’s all the ongoing technology upgrades that make the partnership with Kenworth next level, according to WyoTech owner Jim Mathes.
“This is a great, great partnership with Kenworth to get the latest technology with brand-new trucks,” he said. “It’s truly amazing. We’re just going to continually keep these a couple of years, and then turn them back over to Kenworth, and they’ll keep giving us new technology.”
Cindy Barlow, director of industry relations for WyoTech, said she took a WyoTech team to see the trucks being manufactured in Chillicothe, Iowa. It was an amazing experience to watch how these trucks come together, as well as all the quality control that goes into each and every one.
“Our team signed the floorboard of that truck before it was ever put together,” Barlow said. “When it was just a cab, we all got to write our names and a little message.”
Barlow’s message thanked Kenworth for its great, big heart, and noted that Barlow “loves the bug,” referring to the company’s logo.
“Kenworth is probably one of the best, if not the best quality truck manufacturer,” Mathes added. “And they are on a growth trajectory. They need more diesel technicians, so they’re investing in us, and therefore our graduates will have a great opportunity to go to work for their general dealerships.”
Just Let Her Look Under The Hood
Rodrigues told Cowboy State Daily she’s excited to look under the hoods of these brand-new Kenworths, which she has heard have a lot of electronics.
“That seems to be where the industry is going now,” she said.
She’s now in the second phase of her program, where she’ll begin learning about the thousands of sensors that newer trucks have.
Scott Martin is excited about the new trucks as well. He chose the diesel mechanic career because he loves cars, and he thinks working with heavy equipment will help him to “bulk” up.
WyoTech hooked him on its program right from the start when a recruiter visited his school in California and talked about all the hands-on training he was going to get.
“At first I was going to do the ranch program,” he said. “But that got canceled. But I really love fixing things and watching them work after I’m done. Seeing the customer happy, that’s like a dopamine feeling. That’s basically why I like it.”
Before he left for WyoTech, he already had job offers for when he finished the program. But now he’s got even more companies to consider, thanks to all the job fairs the school offers its students.
“There were multiple different vendors, some kinds I’ve never seen before. I talked to a lot of them yesterday, and the one who stood out to me the most was these mines in Nevada. I forget what they’re called, but they had the best benefits I’ve seen, the best pay schedule and overall work.”
That has him thinking he might not go home just yet after earning his diesel mechanic degree. He might explore other opportunities first, to see how big his horizons really are.
Dominic Cable, from Utah, agreed that the career opportunities he’s found while at WyoTech are mind-blowing. At the most recent job fair, he signed up for 12 interviews and talked to companies across the country.
“Just kind of doing my research and trying to figure out where I want to go,” he said.
He’s already got one official offer letter from the job fair and has made it to the next round of interviews with several others. In fact, Friday he was scheduled to have an interview in Utah with a prospective employer.
“Everyone that I’ve talked to has been getting pretty good offers,” he added.
Kenworth is one of the options he’s particularly interested in and, while he’ll be graduating too soon to use them in his own program, he sees having their trucks at WyoTech as a huge, golden opportunity for all the diesel mechanic students to come.
AI Proofing Their Careers
While trucks are moving toward more and more automation, diesel mechanic isn’t a job Rodrigues feels could be stolen by artificial intelligence.
“We’re here to get down and dirty underneath the engines,” she said. “We’ve got to ‘bar’ them over and I don’t think AI will be able to do that.”
By “barring” engines over, Rodrigues means careful adjustments of engine parts so that she can actually see what might be going on under the hood.
“I think AI would think of what cylinders to adjust, but then it wouldn’t bar it over right,” she said. “And then, if the engine stated up, it would just seize the engine.”
“Barring” things over is also messy work, she added.
“You’ll see the valve squish and then oil will come out,” she said.
Oil squirting out all over everything is something Rodrigues believes wouldn’t sit too well with an electronic, artificial intelligence gadget sitting under the hood.
Rodrigues’ assessment is spot-on, said Bill Metzger, who used to be a WyoTech instructor but since taken a job with Kenworth as the large technical school program manager. He was instrumental in helping the Kenworth partnership move forward at WyoTech.
“You’re never going to be able to eliminate the human factor out of the trucking industry,” he said. “It doesn’t matter how smart that truck is. You still have to have a person who is equally as smart to be able to diagnose and fix the problems that it’s having.”
Best Program In America
Metzger and Erickson said Kenworth chose to partner with WyoTech in its efforts to boost diesel mechanic jobs because the program has no equal in America.
“WyoTech is No. 1,” Metzger said. “And we started getting some dealer feedback about if Kenworth was to go in and create a program that would support our dealers, what would be some of the things we’d be looking for?”
At the top of dealers’ wish list for employees was professionalism — people who show up on time and ready to work. That’s an area where WyoTech particularly shines, Metzger said.
“At WyoTech, they take these students, and they hold them accountable for showing up on time, being here from 7 a.m. in the morning to 4:20 in the afternoon and not being able to miss more than 10% of the time you’re in class,” he said. “So, they’re actually teaching them what our industry is looking for. Accountability is the biggest thing.”
Another big item on the wish list was transparency as far as what the graduates can actually do.
“All of our dealers know, as an entry-level technician, what they’re getting (from WyoTech),” Metzger said. “They know what that student was exposed to with their ability to learn and what knowledge they should have when they come out and get hired.”
Erickson, who said he’s traveled the country, agreed with Metzger’s assessment of WyoTech.
“This place is hands above anything else I’ve seen anywhere else,” he said. “The instructors here care. They are invested in the success of the students.”
Demand Is Rock Solid For Foreseeable Future
Diesel Mechanics can expect to make big bucks into the foreseeable future, WyoTech Director of Industry Relations Cindy Barlow told Cowboy State Daily. The demand isn’t going to go down any time soon.
“With our career fair, we had 103 employers nationwide, and they’re all looking for techs who can handle stuff like this,” she said. “They had amazing opportunities, too. I mean, tuition reimbursement opportunities, reverse tuition opportunities — we have over 200 companies that offer tuition reimbursement to WyoTech students and the employment packages are phenomenal. From 401Ks to health insurance, you name it.”
Some of the companies are offering help with toolboxes and relocation as well, Barlow added.
“The trades are where it’s at,” she said. “The trades are where students are going to catapult their careers.”
Barlow has seen many WyoTech grads go into entry-level positions and quickly move up into leadership roles.
With technology continuing to ramp up, Barlow doesn’t see the situation changing anytime soon for the diesel mechanic sector.
“That’s the importance of this partnership,” she said. “If we don’t keep up with this technology, we’ll be behind.”
With the Kenworth partnership including an update on equipment every few years, WyoTech has positioned itself to remain cutting edge far into the future when it comes to one of the most in-demand, best-paid professions around.
Renée Jean can be reached at renee@cowboystatedaily.com.
