How the next generation of auto techs is preparing for the electric vehicle transition

From self-driving cars to electric vehicles, automobiles are becoming more technologically advanced and there’s a shortage of workers with the skills needed to keep them on the road. One college is focused on training the next generation of the automotive industry, including many who may have once thought there wasn’t a place for them there. Ali Rogin reports for our series, Rethinking College.
Geoff Bennett:
From self-driving cars to electric vehicles, automobiles are becoming more technologically advanced, and there’s a shortage of workers who have the diverse skills needed to keep them on the road.
Ali Rogin visited one college focused on training the next generation of the automotive industry, including many people who may have once thought there wasn’t a place for them there.
It’s part of our series, Rethinking College.
Caid Kroeger, Instructor, Department of Automotive Technology, Weber State University: Hey, guys, for this assignment, we’re going to be tearing down the engines, much like you guys are.
Ali Rogin:
At Weber State University in Layton, Utah, it’s no coincidence that the automotive program shares a building with computer science.
Caid Kroeger:
We have autonomous vehicles now. We have adaptive cruise control. We have a full-on hybrid and full-on electric vehicles now. So, the old days of just being able to pick up a wrench and work on your car are falling farther and farther behind.
Ali Rogin:
Weber State instructor Caid Kroeger trains his students for the cars and the jobs of the future.
Caid Kroeger:
You are no longer just your average mechanic that’s diagnosing base engine concerns. You are I.T., you are an engineer, you are a tech expert at this point.
Ali Rogin:
Weber has been keeping students on the cutting edge of the auto industry since 1922, not long after Henry Ford launched the Model T.
The university works with companies like Toyota, GM, and Chrysler to make sure students are learning the most in-demand skills. Many students already work in the field and can translate their professional certifications into credits towards an associates degree. They can stop there, or keep going, or come back later for their bachelor of science in automotive technology.
Brian Rague, Associate Dean of College of Engineering, Applied Science, and Technology at Weber State University: Fundamental knowledge about their particular field is important to us and we build that up. But we build it up in a kind of a gradated or stackable way, so that students can earn degrees and credentials as they move along.
Ali Rogin:
Brian Rague is the associate dean of the college of engineering, applied science and technology.
It seems like this hybrid approach to higher education is really well-geared to this national moment that we’re in.
Brian Rague:
It requires of the university to be attuned to what the needs are out there. And you get that information from the industry partners, and then you make the curriculum kind of fit those needs. And that is not an easy thing to do at a university.
Ali Rogin:
One of the biggest needs is the work force. According to one study, the U.S. auto industry will need more than 300,000 new auto techs over the next four years to keep up with demand. Many of those jobs will need to be more technical than mechanical, making it an opportune time for the horsepower industry to rethink manpower.
Women make up about half the American work force, but only about a quarter of the automotive industry. Experts say that’s a missed opportunity.
Jessica Slater, Department Chair, Department of Automotive Technology, Weber State University: I think there are a lot of fantastic women and there are a lot of brilliant women that are in other industries that we are missing.
Ali Rogin:
Jessica Slater is the department chair of Weber’s automotive program.
Jessica Slater:
Where would the automotive industry be now if those women had been a part of it? If maybe they had entertained a STEM or an engineering field, where would we be now? It’s a curious thought. I think we would be somewhere else entirely.
Ali Rogin:
Today, women are a little over 10 percent of the undergrad auto program at Weber, and the college hopes to boost those numbers in part by offering college-level courses to students at 16 local high schools.
Jessica Slater:
We want to get in front of these young women, again, before any preconceptions are developed on this is what I’m capable of doing because I’m a woman. We want to get to them when they’re 12 years old and they think they can do whatever a boy can do, because they can.
Ali Rogin:
It can be easy for young girls to lose that attitude. Luckily, 20-year-old Delanie Long held on to it.
Delanie Long, Student:
Since I was young, my dad always worked on cars and stuff like that. And he would actually try and show my brother everything and get him into it. So, I just tagged along and I enjoyed it more than my brother.
Ali Rogin:
You’re a woman going into potentially a very right now male-dominated industry. How do you feel about that?
Delanie Long:
At first, it was really intimidating, to be honest. But I do feel welcome here. It’s fun to show, like, the boys what’s up kind of thing.
Ali Rogin:
Not just the boys. Her father too.
Delanie Long:
It’s also fun, like teaching him some things I have learned here that he didn’t know. He’s shocked, but proud of me, for sure.
Ali Rogin:
But attitudes take longer to change than tires. A 2020 survey of the auto industry found that 91 percent of female respondents believed there was a bias towards men for leadership positions. Only 47 percent of men felt that way.
But Weber alum Beth Miya, who now works for the Cummins engine and generator company, says the industry has improved since she started out over two decades ago.
Beth Miya, Weber State University Graduate:
I couldn’t get a job turning wrenches when I first started out in the automotive industry, even though I had more experience than some of my male counterparts. It’s obviously a very, very different world. I mean, I graduated from Weber State in like ’04. I think that just the assumptions that females shouldn’t be there is gone.
Ali Rogin:
But Miya says she still deals with sexism in the industry.
Beth Miya:
Everywhere I go, they usually assume I am the marketing girl or the secretary that’s helping. And then I get up and I’m presenting the technical information. I always feel that I have to prove myself, when my male counterparts can walk up and they just listen. I have to kind of show them why I’m there.
Ali Rogin:
So, Miya is paying it forward, speaking when she can to younger students who are curious about the automotive field.
Beth Miya:
It would have been nice for me to see a female instructor. You know, that would have been encouraging for sure. As cheesy as it sounds, anywhere I can actually appear and be a female is a good thing.
Ali Rogin:
Caid Kroeger says the industry would benefit from more women joining.
Caid Kroeger:
I have found that our female students, the women in the industry, approach diagnostic in a very unique way and they end up being great at solving problems.
Ali Rogin:
Plus, these days, the auto industry isn’t just looking for gearheads.
Caid Kroeger:
Much like the days of old, we still get the students that love automotive for the horsepower, the loud noises, the — like, what people, what some students end up coming to the automotive industry in the first place.
But the other side of that, though, too, is now I have a lot of students that are interested in I.T. that are still interested in cars or interested in battery design.
Ali Rogin:
Jessica Slater says there’s more opportunity in automotive than outsiders realize.
Jessica Slater:
There’s a misconception, if you go into automotive, you’re just going to be a grease monkey, that’s all you’re good for. And that is entirely inaccurate. There are so many channels and avenues for this industry that people just don’t know about.
Ali Rogin:
That’s why Weber State is working to change stereotypes about the industry and the people who work in it.
For the “PBS News Hour,” I’m Ali Rogin in Layton, Utah.