Coastal Alabama Community College has partnered with Alto Products Corp. for the first machinist apprenticeship in Southwest Alabama. It is the first such partnership in the region to be competency-based and builds on the College’s recent certification as a Department of Labor registered apprenticeship sponsor.
For more than 50 years, Alto has manufactured more than a billion friction clutches, steel reaction plates, and powertrain components for automotive, hi-performance, heavy-duty, industrial, marine, and motorcycle applications. Alto is the leader in the development of wet friction technology used in powertrain components and system solutions.
Beginning this fall, Alto Products will offer apprentices the opportunity to be employed at their facility and attend classes at the brand-new machine tool shop at Coastal Alabama’s Atmore Campus.
“We are very pleased to partner with Coastal Alabama Community College in this apprentice program”, said David Landa, President of Alto Products Corp. “Hiring and retaining talented people in is critical to our business and the economic growth of our community”, Landa continued.
“As we build out our apprenticeship platform, we look for areas and our market that have a high concentration of certain occupations and machine-tool is one of them,” said Dr. Joshua Duplantis, dean of workforce development for the college. The average age of workers in manufacturing continues to rise with not enough trained employees waiting to take over their responsibilities.
Coastal Alabama Community College is actively pursuing partnerships to develop programs to put students to work immediately, while they earn their associate degree and are trained at specific companies.
“There is a need for a really solid pipeline supplying the next generation of trained employees coming out of a well-defined system,” Duplantis said. “We are thankful for the leadership of Alto Products Corp, and their willingness to partner with our college as we grow the next generation of skilled tradespeople in Escambia county.”
To receive an application packet, contact Dr. Josh Duplantis at [email protected] with the subject line Machine Tool Apprenticeship Program.
