West Branch celebrates its new Industrial Maintenance program

BELOIT − Jennifer Mondak never thought her future would include electrical circuits or welded steel − until now.

"Now that I'm working with it ... yeah, maybe," the 18-year-old high school senior said.

Mondak and 20 other students at West Branch High School are taking classes in a new industrial maintenance program that started in the fall. The four courses are manufacturing operations, welding, industrial maintenance, and hydraulics and pneumatics.

The school's first Industrial Maintenance Showcase, held Thursday night, displayed the group's progress for friends and family, and representatives from several regional companies. MAC Trailer, CTM Labeling Systems, Hickey Metal, TimkenSteel and others were in attendance.

Micki Egli, superintendent of West Branch Local Schools, said the program is a partnership between the district and several companies to provide students with skills before they enter the workforce, separate from career tech coursework offered elsewhere.

The program, run by Chris Dorris, took a year and a $150,000 Equity for Each grant to get started.

"I knew that we had a lot of kids exiting our halls every year that weren't going to college and they didn't go to the (Mahoning County Career & Technical Center). They were going out into the work world with no skills, and we needed to do something for that population of kids," Egli said.

The class has a mixture of juniors and seniors.

Elgi called the launch a success. "I was hoping for 10 kids and I got 21," she said Thursday.

Egli added that the district wants to expand the program, putting it in larger spaces, and purchase more equipment with grants.

"We need actually a few more machines that aren't in here right now," she said.

Among the machines available is welding equipment, a pneumatic training system, an AC/DC electrical training system and a robotic arm.

A robotic arm demonstration was led by senior Jaxon Robb, 17, and juniors Xander Culbertson, 16, and Trevor Minnich, 16. With programming codes entered into a computer, the group had the arm grab a bottle of hand sanitizer and give it a squirt, and move and stack blocks.

"(The robot arm) is fun," Minnich said. "We get to program it and see it run, so there's a lot of creativity."

James Hill, 18, a senior, showed how to wire the pneumatic system to create motion with air, explaining the different gauges and values used. "I've learned what each of all these do and how they put all these together, how they read things like the schematics and all that."

Larry Starcher's grandson Aiden Hurles and Mark Biskup's son Charlie Biskup are in the program, too. Both gave it high praise.

"Outstanding," Starcher said.

Biskup added: "I think it's awesome because not everybody is going to college, a few kids are going to want to work with their hands. You figure, we're agricultural. There's a lot farms around. If these kids can come out and learn this kind of stuff, they do a lot of things, just not welding."

Reach Benjamin Duer at 330-580-8567 or ben.duer@cantonrep.com. On X (formerly Twitter): @bduerREP.

This article originally appeared on The Repository: West Branch offers Industrial Maintenance courses