Firms look to engineer career paths for Mid-Ohio Valley students

MARIETTA -- A career in engineering can be a good long-term investment for young people that pays well, provides endless interest and is available close to home.

A group of firms that value engineering talent offered presentations with that message to a group of 56 high school sophomores from Washington and Wood counties Friday morning at Washington State Community College on Discover Engineering Day, organized by Building Bridges to Careers. The students rigged up simple electrical circuits, made polymer balls that bounced from vinegar and latex, and got their hands and minds occupied in other simple engineering exercises.

In one room, WSCC engineering instructor John Burgardt led a group that devised boats from aluminum foil, then filled them with pennies in a plastic storage box filled with water. The top entry held 95 cents.

"I think we need to count those again," one student competitor said.

Burgardt said the game illustrated some basic concepts of buoyancy.

"It's one small part of physics, the start of one of many pathways to an engineering career," he said.

In a nearby room, Josh Frash from Chemours was explaining the construction of polymers, long chains of molecules that form the basis of plastics, including the Teflon nonstick coating made at the Parkersburg factory.

"It's a backbone of carbon with many attachments," he said. "It includes fluorine, for example, to make it stable. We make it in big reactors, in large amounts, and it has lots of applications."

Assisted by several engineers, Frash helped the students create polymer bouncy balls from vinegar, latex and a small quantity of other additives, along with food coloring to give them some flash.

Cameron Hendrickson and Jack Warfield, both from Warren High School, mixed the ingredients and added food coloring, looking to create brown from red and green. The mixture set quickly in a cup and Hendrickson squeezed it, then sank the gobbet into a bucket of water to remove the strands.

"I think I see a bit of purple," he said, inspecting the result.

Down the hall in the engineering building, Sean Kufel of Power Supply Engineers showed a group how to set up an electrical circuit.

Sarah Michael of Wood County Christian School smiled and triumphantly held up glowing red and green bulbs after flicking a switch.

Michael said she would "definitely" consider a career in engineering.

"I like it," she said.

Sitting next to her was Miranda Sampson, a Waterford High School student, who said she enjoyed the presentation.

"I like the experimenting, that it's about working with things to make our lives better, more efficient," she said.

Across the table, David Cassill of Wood County Christian, said he was considering a career in engineering.

"I've already looked into the engineering programs at several colleges," he said.

Kufel said his firm decided to get involved in Discover Engineering Day as a presenter after participating last year in the networking session held over lunch following the demonstrations.

"We work with the electrical utility industry, and a lot of the engineers in the industry are on the verge of retiring," Kufel said. "There aren't enough young people coming in to replace them, so we're hoping to use opportunities like this to drive kids into careers as power engineers."

Tonya Davis of Building Bridges to Careers said the primary intent of the event was to expose students who are making decisions about what profession they'd like to enter to the range of local work and career opportunities.

"They might not realize there are jobs here, close to home, for them," she said. "How can we keep them here if they think they have to move away to get work?"

Frash, of Chemours, said the company has a workforce of about 800 people at the Parkersburg center with a wide range of occupations, and the company is constantly on the lookout for new talent.

"There are a lot of different roles, operators, chemical and mechanical engineers, electricians," he said. "It's a variety, and not all of them need a four-year degree."

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Discover Engineering Day

* Where: Washington State Community College

* When: Friday morning and lunchtime

* Who: 56 Washington and Wood county high school sophomores

* The goal: Offer students information about local careers in engineering

* Presenters: Chemours, Burgess and Niple, Power Systems Engineering, Kory Benedict, Magnum Magnetics

Source: Building Bridges to Careers