It is no secret that today’s job market is very difficult to navigate, but this is especially true for new college graduates. Those trying to enter the workforce after receiving their degrees often find themselves in a catch-22 situation; they need a job to get professional experience but cannot get a job due to lack of professional experience. Oftentimes, this leads to new grads working in roles outside of their chosen profession or industry, which further delays their ability to develop a professional career in their field of study. On the other side of this equation are industries which have a shortage of qualified professionals.
Despite massive growth of automation (and the need for controls engineering) in recent years across several industrial sectors, there are only an estimated 22,000 controls engineers in the USA. Of that estimate, only a fraction of those is in power generation, with an even smaller percentage of those in renewable energy. However, there is a way to address both concerns and that is with college internships.
This past June, Nor-Cal Controls launched its summer engineering internship program. The purpose of this internship was to identify college students who would be interested in pursuing an engineering career in renewable energy after graduation and have them acclimate to our company while also teaching them the fundamentals of power generation controls engineering. We began our candidate search during the spring at Sacramento State University’s Computer Science and Engineering career fair. Our team met with nearly 100 enthusiastic students who were very interested in possibly working in the renewable energy industry. After a series of interviews, we ended up choosing two interns: Jaren Johnson (mechanical engineering) and Hark Uppal (computer science). Originally, we only had one intern position, but the team was so impressed with these two during their respective interviews that they decided to hire them both.
Understanding that this would be both candidates’ first exposure to a professional engineering company and controls engineering, we laid out a program that would touch on an all the different aspects of a typical controls/SCADA engineering project. Our interns started out in our Production warehouse where they received hands-on experience with assembling communication devices, MET stations, and SCADA racks. They learned how to read engineering schematics, configure devices, and most importantly, how each assembly fit into the big picture of a controls project. Next, they spent time with our Network Engineers for an introduction to industrial network principles and configured network switches. Last, but certainly not least, our interns spent a significant amount of time with our Automation Engineers. Here, they learned the fundamentals of controls engineering and got hands-on with PLC programming, Red Lion configuration, and HMI development.
At the end of the summer, our interns gave us a presentation about what they learned during their time with us.
The launch of our first engineering internship was a rousing success and an enriching experience for the interns and the company.
When asked if this program affected his career outlook, Johnson replied,
“Before this internship, I knew nothing about automation or controls. Now I understand that this is a growing and legitimate career path for young engineers like myself.”
Uppal echoed that sentiment
“There are, more avenues I can explore in my career thanks to the tools I was given here.”
For the team at Nor-Cal, this internship was particularly meaningful. Zach Whitehead, one of the Automation Engineer intern mentors, stated
“As a fresh grad, I had no experience, but someone took a chance on me for an internship, which led me directly to my career here at Nor-Cal. I look at our internship program as a way to pay that opportunity forward to others.”
With this initial success, we look forward to continuing our internship program that will help promising college students gain valuable professional experience before they enter the workforce and encourage a new generation of engineers to pursue a career in renewable energy power generation controls.
At Nor-Cal Controls, we are passionate about what we do. Learn more about our company perks and/or reach out to chat about your next big project!
