Students at the highest level of the automotive program, Practicum in Transportation Systems, have been touring shops such as Toyota of Cedar Park, First Texas Honda, Buick and GMC.
These tours are in preparation for the second semester of the school year where they can shadow a mechanical technician at a professional shop.
“I didn’t want to go in [to shadowing] without knowing what [the shop] would look like, it’s good to see the work environment that I’m going to be in,” senior Gavin Odom said. “I liked Toyota [and] Genesis. I liked the people there and it’s not too clean, but it’s also not too dirty. It’s very comfortable.”
These tours allow students to get a better understanding of what the process of working in the automotive industry might look like.
“They have a team for quick things like oil changes,” Odom said, “then they have levels above that, where, if you’ve been there for a certain amount of time, you advance to that level and you do the bigger jobs, like engine rebuilds and manufacture recalls.”
Odom believes that these tours help students who plan on becoming automotive technicians narrow down their choices by allowing them to see the various types of shops.
“[The shops] like to have the students eventually work there because they get the experience of that specific shop,” Odom said. “That’s why we tour the facilities, to see where the students would fit in, see what the shops are like before they commit to a shop and to really see what it’s like to be an automotive technician.”
