Fluid power association makes education inroads

The 2009-2010 CFPA Board of Directors (standing): Richard Leece (left), Doug Newton, Mark Hoyland, Don Trenn, John Bachmann, Richard Doherty, George Connell, Chris Ballard and Alan Wheatley.

Ilesh Patel (inset bottom), a student at Centennial College of Applied Arts & Technology, won the DPN-sponsored CFPA Scholarship for academic achievement in the study of fluid power within the college’s Automation & Robotics program.

Jason Le (inset top), a student at Mohawk College of Applied Arts & Technology, won the Bosch Rexroth Canada-sponsored Hans deWaard Memorial Scholarship for academic achievement in the study of fluid power with Mohawk’s Industrial & Mechanical Engineering program.

Andrew Sinclair (inset middle), a student at Centennial, won the Flo-Draulic Controls-sponsored Edward Stock Memorial Scholarship.

 CFPA chairman John Bachmann of Wainbee provided an update on the progress of the Industrial Careers Pathway (ICP) program at Mohawk College in Ontario (ICP curriculum is also at BCIT). ICP (www.industrialcareerspathway.org), a co-partnership with the CFPA and over 20 other industry associations, “provides business literacy training” to technology-oriented employees of industrial distribution companies, said Bachmann. One course has been completed and another is underway at Mohawk, he added.
 
Don Trenn, chairman of the CFPA Western Chapter and Gir Del Hydraulic Services, pointed to the successful implementation of a new Fluid Power Certificate program at the Northern Alberta Institute of Technology in Edmonton (www.nait.ca/fpc). The six-module program was developed in cooperation with NAIT and the fluid power industry.

He also partly blamed the media for some of the doom and gloom: “thankfully we didn’t have CNN during the Great Depression.”