As an instructor I get the opportunity to shape the future of my students in a positive way. There are some people that I have to go the extra mile to make them successful. This was the case with one young man who signed up for my class last year. He was in his mid twenties, had a degree in marketing, but had experienced difficulty finding a good paying job in his field. Living in the midwest there are not a lot of those type of jobs available. Our are is basically blue collar and most of the residents do some sort of laboring job. He finally came to this realization and decided to take the course for an HVAC technician at our local trade school. This is how I came to meet this young man. I could tell from the start that he was resistant to the concept of working with HVAC units for the rest of his life. He said that he chose my class because he knew people who worked in the field and that they made a good living do it. I started telling him that there are other areas of the HVAC industry that he may be better suited for. Many of the larger HVAC companies in our area have departments that design the systems, problem solve issues of air flow and design for existing systems and even have marketing department to draw in new clients. By taking my class and understanding how these systems work, it would give him an advantage in applying for these type of jobs. I could see the wheels of interest start to turn and he really buckled down and applied himself in my class from that day on.
