March 28, 2024
BANGOR DAILY NEWS (BANGOR, MAINE

Cooperative effort giving students advanced technical training on cars

HOULTON — When William Cyr Jr. of Danforth goes to school, his classes are often held under a car.

Cyr is one of about 20 students enrolled in the automobile student service educational training program at Central Maine Technical College in Auburn. The program is a cooperative effort of the school, Ford Motor Co., and Ford and Lincoln-Mercury dealers to meet the need for more advanced technical training for service technicians.

The program is a two-year college program that leads to an associate degree in automobile technology. Participating students complete about eight weeks of classroom work alternated with eight weeks of full-time work at an automobile dealership. At the dealership, the students work with an experienced mechanic in the area of training received during the previous eight weeks of classroom work.

The program has been run by Ford for about seven years, but the CMTC program is the first to be offered in Maine. About 2,000 students are enrolled in the program throughout the country.

Students are required to pay the cost of their education, plus tools and other course materials. The dealership where the student works pays the student’s wages during each eight-week period of employment.

Jerry York, general manager at York Ford-Toyota in Houlton where Cyr works, said the program was developed to meet a shortage of trained mechanics who could work on the more technologically advanced modern cars.

“As cars become more complex, the field is requiring more trained technicians,” he said. “Technicians were going from dealer to dealer and there was always a void. There just weren’t enough technicians to go around. The program is a way to fill the void.”

He said that Cyr began his work at the dealership doing pre-delivery work on cars to get them ready for sale. Since then he has advanced to suspension and steering work. As time goes by and Cyr gains additional classroom and on-the-job training, he will become involved with more advanced repairs, he said.

Cyr said he learned about the program from his brother, Brent, who is a master mechanic at York Ford. He said that although he had not considered a career as an automobile mechanic before, he liked working with his hands and had helped his brother work on vehicles at home.


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