Retraining for Photonics Technicians

Many U.S. employers of photonics technicians are hiring workers that are underprepared for their jobs. Some of these techs are educated/trained in other technical fields; some have only a high school education, or some post secondary education in an unrelated field. A recent study conducted for OP-TEC reveals that employers are hiring 400-600 unprepared photonics techs each year. Employers don’t want to do this, but they’re doing it to survive; they need to fill staffing slots to meet their commitments and our colleges aren’t turning out enough photonics grads.

We need 2200 new photonics techs this year, but our colleges are only producing about 250 completers. OP-TEC is working with our U.S. colleges to start more photonics AAS degree programs and to increase the enrollment and completion rates of existing programs. But it will take years for us to “build our capacity” to have enough completers to fill the annual demand for photonics techs.

In the meantime, employers will continue to “make do” with underprepared workers; and these new or transferred workers will have to “learn on the job”. On the job training (OJT) is important and useful, but it is usually limited to survival training on specific equipment and processes that are peculiar to an employer’s current equipment and work assignments. It rarely includes the basic knowledge and skills that underpin the technology and provide the foundation for survival and/or growth. In the case of photonics, this basic knowledge/skill includes geometric and wave optics, laser operation and output characteristics - and laser safety.

So, what can be done “in the meantime”? If photonics techs need some education and training in this field, and if they are near one of the colleges in our country that offers photonics courses (see a map of these college locations in my May 6 blog posting), then they should investigate the offerings that are available locally. But this option may not be practical for the following reasons:

• There is not a photonics college within commuting distance.
• You may not have the time available to attend the college 2-3 evenings/week.

To address the need of employed photonics techs for education/training in this field, OP-TEC has developed and tested hybrid online courses in optics and photonics that can be offered by any college that has the appropriate faculty and labs to teach them. The course is hybrid because of the way it is delivered. Students can take the classroom part of the course “online” from their homes, workplace or while they are on the road. Videos of the lab activities are also shown online. Periodically, students come to the college to conduct the hands-on lab activities. This can be once every other two weeks or all at the end of the course, depending on the preference of the students and the college. If sufficient students from one employer constitute a course, the labs could be conducted at the employer worksite.

The six modules in the first course cover the following basic topics:

• Nature and Properties of Light
• Optical Handling and Positioning
• Laser Safety
• Geometric Optics
• Wave Optics
• Principles of Lasers

Employers have verified that these topics constitute the “core” of basic photonics. Supplemental math material can also be included for those students who need to brush up on their skills in algebra and trig.

In our nation’s present economic condition, with a high jobless rate, the news about available jobs in photonics sounds like a golden opportunity for some unemployed workers to “get back on the payroll” and enter some rewarding careers. But if you’re unprepared for a job, you’ll probably stay at the entry-level job, with little chance for advancement; you might even get laid off when a more qualified person can be hired. So, if you want to have a successful, rewarding career as a photonics technician, it’s important that you build your knowledge and skills in the basics of photonics technology.

If you’re interested and need to get connected with a photonics college, contact OP-TEC. Or, if you’re an employer looking for a way to upgrade your techs in photonics, we can help you find a college to provide these services. Contact us for more information!

OP-TEC Will Prepare You to Teach Optics, Lasers, and Photonics

Photonics is an “enabling technology.” This means that optics, lasers, fiber-optics, and other electro-optics devices may introduce new solutions, enhance devices, or improve the performance of processes in fields such as medicine, telecommunications, environmental monitoring, manufacturing/materials processing, defense/homeland security, alternative energy, lighting, displays, and many other areas where today’s students will be tomorrow’s workers. Beginning now and growing rapidly in the future, photonics will be as integral to technology as electronics has been for the past several decades.

If you are teaching science or technology in high school, are you introducing optics and photonics to your students and giving them the foundation they will need in this area? Or if you are a college faculty member in a technical field, are you providing the basics of photonics and its applications related to your field, so that your students will enhance their career opportunities and be prepared to grow in their jobs?

OP-TEC has two courses that secondary and postsecondary educators can use to provide the photonics foundations their students will need. If you’re interested, we can help you get started.

• Course 1: Fundamentals of Light and Lasers
• Course 2: Elements of Photonics

The courses cover topics in basic light sources and optics, laser principles and laser safety, fiber optics, holography, and laser applications. The courses can be tailored to cover applications in the particular field the student is studying.

The costs for putting in Course 1 may be a lot less than you think. We have an equipment list for colleges and are developing a lower-cost version for high schools. You may even be able to borrow some of the equipment from your physics labs.

For the last two years, OP-TEC has provided hybrid online courses to train high school teachers and college faculty about lasers and optics and how to teach these courses. This spring 22 educators enrolled in training for Course 1. Over a 12-week period, they have studied (with the help of an online moderator) all six modules, engaged in online discussions, worked the problems, and observed streaming videos of the labs, where they recorded data and performed calculations. This month, the completers will travel to a ”photonics college” for three days, where they will work all of the labs, meet with experienced faculty members, and gain information about equipping and setting up a photonics lab. OP-TEC will provide the faculty training course without charge to qualified teachers. Their only costs will be their travel expenses to the “photonics college.”

As a faculty member who had completed OP-TEC's "Faculty Development" course last year for Fundamentals of Light & Lasers, Course 1, I can report that I am delighted with the support of OP-TEC's staff and their college partners! I am working to build our photonics/laser program at my campus. We are adopting the OP-TEC materials for our college and this will be the first semester that we will be using the OP-TEC Course 1 textbook. OP-TEC has been very helpful with helping me develop my course locally. I strongly recommend other faculty who wish to add photonics to their colleges & universities to consider taking the OP-TEC Faculty Development course!” Tom Millen, Assistant Professor, Electronics & Computer Technology, Ivy Tech Community College

OP-TEC will offer both courses in c/y 09-10. So if you are interested, please contact us and let us help you help your students become qualified for the jobs of tomorrow in the emerging field of photonics.

Photonics Summer Camps and Institutes for High School Teachers and Students

Emerging technologies such as photonics and nanotechnology must be experienced to be appreciated. Unfortunately, community and technical college offerings in these fields are some of the best kept secrets in the country. High school teachers, counselors, students - and their parents - need to experience these technologies first hand, and they need to learn about the wonderful, rewarding career opportunities that are available to young people.

Visits by college representatives to high schools and “gee whiz” demonstrations may open some doors, but they must be followed up by experiences in the college laboratories where students and their teachers can see how the equipment is being used and to participate in “hands-on” lab activities.

The “middle 50%” of our high school achievers are frequently not encouraged to consider careers in emerging technologies. Most of these young people are capable of mastering the math, science and technology that these careers require - and they are more inclined to enjoy and benefit from education when they see that it has a purpose. They deserve these rewarding, challenging jobs that are available to them, and our country deserves the talents that they can provide if they are encouraged and educated.

Colleges that offer technician education programs in new and emerging technologies must be engaged in intense, focused outreach efforts to high school students, teachers and counselors to build the “high school pipeline” and strengthen their enrollments. Some of the institutions in OP-TEC’s Photonics College Network (OPCN) have initiated novel and successful outreach efforts to nearby high schools. Two of them have written monographs, documenting their strategies and successes.

Texas State Technical College (TSTC) Waco employs a young, marketing-trained recruiter and the regional Tech Prep coordinator to make the initial contact with high schools throughout the state. Interested teachers, students and counselors are invited to attend hands-on, one-week summer institutes in lasers and nanotechnology. The classes are held in the TSTC labs and the attendees reside in on-campus dorms. The TSTC monograph contains descriptions of recruitment strategies, format/agenda of the institute, costs, labs/equipment and the participant manual. Enrollment in each year has doubled; this summer (the 3rd) enrollment is expected to be 60 attendees (~3 institutes). Examples of comments from participants include:

“..The presenters and presentations were excellent…I will be recommending this venue to my counterparts and my students.” (teacher)

“The LEO program is really awesome. It doesn’t just teach you about lasers, it also teaches responsibilities….I plan on coming back for the week program next year. I also hope to come to TSTC for college after that.” (student)

Indiana University of Pennsylvania's (IUP) Northpointe Regional Two-Year Campus, uses a comprehensive approach with nearby high schools that has four elements. These four elements are provided below and presented, in detail, in the IUP monograph.

1. Presentations in High School Classrooms - Hands-on presentations about lasers and electro-optics to high school 10th and 11th grade science classes reinforce the science principles, show interesting applications and describe career opportunities and educational pathways.
2. On-Campus Electro-Optic Experiences - Half day sessions at the college for 30-40 high school sophomores, juniors, seniors and their teachers, to familiarize them with EO labs and college life @ IUP.
3. Electro-Optics (EO) Summer Camps for Students - One week sessions where students experience laser and optics science/technology and learn about career opportunities from local and regional employers.
4. Workshops for Teachers and Counselors - One-day experiences to participate in laser/electro-optics hardware activities/demonstrations, discuss educational plans and tour local electro-optics industries.

Over the last three years the outreach efforts have grown from serving 500 students and teachers in 2005-06, to over 2000 students in 2007-08. They have contributed to significant student interest and enrollment growth.

To view, save and/or print these monographs from the OP-TEC website, please click on the title(s) below to access the monograph PDF file.

TSTC Waco’s Photonics Summer Institutes for High School Science & Technology Teachers
Authors: Dr. Larry Grulick & John Pedrotti, TSTC; Dan Hull, OP-TEC

Outreach Activities to Enlist High School Students for Electro-Optics Technician Programs at Indiana University of Pennsylvania, Northpointe Two-Year Campus
Authors: Dr. Feng Zhou, IUP; Dan Hull, OP-TEC

For more information about OP-TEC's free Program Planning Guides and monographs or to request a complimentary bound copy, please click here.

Contact Information:
For more information about the TSTC Summer Institute, please contact john.pedrotti@tstc.edu.
For more information about the IUP outreach activities, please contact fzhou@iup.edu.

The Photonics College Network

Last week I wrote about the rewarding career opportunities for photonics techs that are educated/trained at two year colleges. I also mentioned that there are over 25 community and technical colleges in the U.S. that prepare students for these careers. Most of these colleges have hard-working, competent faculty and excellent facilities. Some have new photonics offerings, some have been in operation for over 30 years - and some are struggling to overcome obstacles, such as low enrollment, retiring faculty or curricula that needs a “new look”. Overall, these colleges currently have about 700 photonics students and 280 completers each year. (Recall that our recent study revealed that U.S. employers need about 2100 new photonic techs this year.)
OP-TEC is working hard to close the gap between supply and demand. We are working with over 200 colleges that are considering or planning new programs in photonics; but new programs take time to develop - this is our long-term strategy. Our short term strategy is to help some of the 30 colleges with existing photonics programs to revitalize and grow. We believe, that with some assistance, the existing programs could significantly increase their output of completers in 2-3 years. (We’ve seen that happen in the last 3 years with our 7 Partner Colleges.) Some of that assistance will come from OP-TEC, but much of the help they need is what they can provide for each other by networking and sharing best practices. To facilitate this OP-TEC is forming the OP-TEC Photonics College Network (OPCN).

Membership in OPCN is available for faculty and administrators of two-year colleges that offer courses/programs in optic and photonics. There is no fee to join, but members will benefit - and be a benefit to others, if they are active, in terms of communication, information-sharing and participation in electronic and/or on-site meetings.

Potential benefits include, but are not limited to, the following:

1. Opportunities to network with photonics faculty and administrators of approximately twenty-five U.S. colleges currently or recently offering photonics education.
2. Access to OPCN e-mail distribution list, member roster, web forum and other networking tools to collaborate and exchange ideas and best practices.
3. OP-TEC curriculum designs, teaching modules, planning guides and monographs of best practices in photonics education.
4. Professional development opportunities and technical assistance through OP-TEC to update, enhance and strengthen photonics programs.
5. Support and information on how to increase program enrollment.
6. Identification of state-wide photonics employers and access to needs assessment survey process.
7. News updates on emerging trends in photonics applications and educational innovations.
8. Eligible for OP-TEC Mini-Grants for program improvement.
9. Information about other potential grant opportunities such as NSF/ATE, DOE and DOL grants.
10. Opportunities for OP-TEC fellowships to attend conferences or workshops.
11. Information on lab equipment availability, used equipment donations or auctions and possible exchange program.
12. Use of and training on OP-TEC’s hybrid, online course for high school dual credit and for retraining employed technicians.

The inaugural meeting of OPCN will take place July 19-20, in Phoenix, during the pre-conference of the HI-TEC conference. A limited number of Fellowships to attend HI-TEC are available to OPCN members through OP-TEC. To learn more about the HI-TEC conference, visit http://www.highimpact-tec.org/.

The Photonics Colleges represent an enormously important national resource. They are a critical link in providing the competent workforce that U.S. employers will need to remain globally competitive in this emerging technical field.

For more information about OPCN or to request a membership application, please contact Donna Flanery at dflanery@op-tec.org or call 254-741-8338 x394.

Need a Job? Learn to be a Photonics Technician

Lots of good people in the U.S. have lost their jobs, or are worried about losing their jobs in the near future. And, many of the jobs that are being eliminated aren’t going to come back after the recession is over because the market is changing and the jobs have become obsolete. It’s time for some people to plan new careers and get the education and training they will need to fulfill their plans. Many high school seniors who planned to attend a university may also be rethinking a more affordable - and possibly more rewarding - education at a community or technical college.

So, whether you’ve recently lost a job, or are worried about the security of the job you’re in, or are just beginning to plan for a career, you might want to consider becoming a photonics technician. A national study of U.S. employers, conducted for OP-TEC, has identified more than 2,100 current jobs for photonics techs that need to be filled this year; this need continues to grow over the next five years. Employers polled for this study early this year - in the height of the current recession - said that jobs for photonics techs were available and not being filled. (A report of this jobs study will appear on the OP-TEC website in a few weeks.)

Most employers want photonics techs that have been educated and trained at 2-year colleges. Starting salaries for photonics techs range from $40,000 to about $55,000 per year. We currently have about 30 colleges throughout the U.S. that offer education/training in photonics technology - and that number will grow substantially in the next several years, because these colleges just can’t keep up with the demand.

There are several avenues to becoming a photonics tech:

Earn an AAS degree in Photonics - If you are currently (or soon to be) a student in higher education, you can enroll in one of the 30 U.S. colleges that offer photonics education. (Six have recently been highlighted in my blogs; the name and contact information of a college near you can be obtained from OP-TEC.) The most important requirements for student success in photonics are a willingness to work hard and the ability to use high school math (algebra, geometry and trig.) If you’re willing to work hard, the college will help you through any math problems you may have. You’ll also get to experience “hands-on learning” in some interesting high-tech labs using lasers and fiber optics, etc.

Earn an Advanced Certificate in Photonics - If you already have an AAS degree in an electronics or manufacturing-based technology, you can build on the education you have, and be employed in a photonics-enhanced field by taking several courses in optics, photonics and laser applications. (See “Photonics-Enabled Technologies” in the OP-TEC web site.) If you are currently employed, you might want to take these courses in a “hybrid, online” format, to reduce the time you have to spend at the college.

Retrain in Photonics to Enter a New Career - If you already have education in mathematics, science and another field of engineering technology (like semiconductor manufacturing), the retraining process may take as little as one semester (or 3-4 courses). These courses may also be available in a hybrid, online format.

If you are interested in pursuing a career in Photonics and need to get connected to a college that offers education in this field, contact OP-TEC and we’ll “hook you up”. If you’re a faculty or administrator, and are interested in your college offering education in Photonics - OP-TEC can help you. If you are a photonics college & want to quote parts or all of this blog, please feel free to do so.

For more information about OP-TEC, photonics technician careers or colleges offering photonics education, please contact us!

Technician Career Opportunities in Energy

One of the hot topics in the news these days is JOBS. People are losing jobs because the demand for their services has been reduced. In some cases, people are losing jobs because the field they are in is becoming obsolete, or is changing so rapidly that their knowledge, skills and experience are obsolete. In other cases these people are working to deliver products and services that are not globally competitive - thus, sales are down and employers are having to create their products and services with less labor, or by out sourcing the work offshore to remain competitive and survive.

In most fields, technicians remain in high demand; but in certain cases we’ve seen that situation change overnight - and the casualties emerge. As technical educators, we would be well-advised to re-examine our curricula and look for ways to assure that our tech grads continue to have core knowledge and skills that will sustain them throughout a career of 40+ years.

One promising area to examine is how the technician’s work relates to energy - now and in the future. Energy is the other hot topic that is being discussed today. But the supply, availability and efficient consumption of energy is not a temporary issue. It is one that we will all have to deal with constantly for the next several generations.

So how should we organize our examination of energy related topics to identify elements that should be included in our curriculum? Here’s my suggestion.

There are four aspects of the energy issue that are being addressed. I recommend that we all examine the curriculum in the various areas of technical education, using these energy aspects as organizers to study their impact on our particular field, and project, with the help of employer advice, the changes in core knowledge and skills that will be necessary to sustain employability.

Energy Sources

• Conventional: fossil fuels and hydroelectricity - How will these be used more effectively in the future? What changes will be made to improve the conversion efficiency and reduce harmful combustion emissions? Will these changes require new equipment, new control systems or different chemicals to control the combustion process?
• Alternative energy sources: especially solar, wind and geothermal - At OP-TEC, we are looking at the use of optics and lasers to improve the efficiency of solar voltaics, like holographic planar windows on collectors, and the use of femtosecond lasers to treat silicon so that it can convert more infrared wavelengths into useful electric energy.

Energy Storage

• Larger and more effective energy storage devices will be needed to temporally redistribute energy collected from solar electric and wind generators. Last week’s blog dealt with the critical need for new battery technologies, and the possible implications it may have on technician education.
• Improvements in the storage and retrieval of geothermal energy are also likely.

Energy Availability (distribution)

New solar electric parks, wind farms and nuclear plants will likely be located in remote sites that are far away from populated areas where the generated energy will be used. This condition will require the design, construction and maintenance of massive new electrical transmission systems. What technologies will these new transmission systems require? Will they be overhead, or underground? Will new metering, relaying, switching and transformer equipment be used? Will there be a need for large AC-to-DC convertors?

Energy Consumption

The cheapest, fastest and easiest sources of energy are those that we save through energy conservation. This means getting by with less and doing more with less - sometimes it can also mean doing better with less. Thirty years ago, when our nation faced an energy crisis, we demonstrated our resilience and patriotic spirit by engaging in unprecedented acts of energy conservation. Most of the accomplishments of that era were due to attitudes, thermostats, insulation and caulking.

Today, we will need to adopt and increase all of those strategies; but we will also develop and utilize new technologies for energy conservation, going even beyond heat pumps and electric cars. Control systems will be redesigned, processes will be improved, better materials will be used and information technology will continue to improve communications and eliminate unnecessary travel time and costs.

This is a brief look at a very important issue for technical educators. I hope it will stimulate you to think about it - and act upon it. I would welcome your comments and extensions to this line of thinking. For the last few years, OP-TEC has developed and tested effective strategies for infusing related technologies to update existing curricula/courses.

And if you want to get serious and collaborate on these topics, please plan to meet with me and Mike Lesiecki at the HI-TEC Conference in Phoenix, July 19-22. We will be leading two interactive sessions on these topics. Click here for more information on HI-TEC 2009!

Batteries for Solar Power: Do we need technicians?

When I was a young boy, I thought the only places where batteries were needed were in flashlights. Then I learned that we had one in our car to get it started. As a young adult, I knew we needed lots of batteries to operate our children’s toys. Now we need them for laptops. Batteries continuously get more important in my life; now they’re vital to the future of alternative energy—particularly wind energy and solar voltaics. Actually, I think they’re absolutely critical to the practical use of these two forms of “green energy”.

Solar voltaic cells and windmills convert these two forms of free, available, natural energy directly to electricity—and only at the times when they are available (i.e., when the sun is shining or the wind is blowing.) So, the problem is that we have to use their electric energy at the precise time when it is available, or we have to be able to store it until it is needed. We will probably need to store the energy from solar voltaics for at least 6-8 hours; that’s a pretty large supply to store.

I can easily think of two possible ways to store this energy:

1. Hydraulically—Use the electricity to pump water up to the front of a dam, and release it, when it is needed, through turbines to drive electric generators (i.e., hydroelectric power.) The problem with this approach is that there aren’t enough dams available to make this approach more than a “drop in the bucket.”

2. Chemically—This is where we need to go. Use the electricity to “charge large batteries” and discharge them when we need it.

From an energy perspective, we are developing batteries for two purposes. To power hybrid-electric, or all-electric cars and to store alternative energy supplies. We’re not ready for either of these applications yet, but we’re working on it. When we are ready, will we need technicians? And where will they come from?

In the March 2, 2009 edition of Newsweek, there is an article on the future of batteries, entitled “To Pack a Real Punch”, which is an interview with Alex Molinaroli, the president of Power Solutions at Johnson Control. Molinaroli says that batteries are the key to our energy future, “You have to match energy production with the demand. That’s easy to do when you have oil or coal in the ground that you can pile up, but you can’t do that with electricity. You have to be able to store it somehow”. Molinaroli is confident that appropriate battery technology can be developed quickly, now that the demand is evident.

If we can practically develop very large battery systems, then we can use “solar parks”; if not, we’ll have to generate and store solar energy “one building at a time”.

Today, the leading technology in battery development is in lithium-ion batteries; the technology is concentrated in Korea and Japan, and some in China. This development has been driven by the needs in electric car development. Other materials for batteries are also being investigated to reduce cost, charging/recharging time and weight/volume. New breakthroughs in battery technology are likely, and they could emerge in the U.S.

The urgency for U.S. battery technology development has emerged rapidly in recent months. We can still be first in this race (and we need to be). But if we want to keep the products from this new technology in the U.S. we will have to prepare for this race—and part of this preparation is to have the appropriate technical workforce to support it.

What areas of technical education are best suited for preparing the workforce in battery development and production? What are the knowledge and skills required for cutting-edge workers in this field? A few weeks ago, I wrote a few blogs about the potential for optics and electro-optics in solar voltaic development, production and use. Battery storage of solar energy will also be critical.

As technical educators we need to think “outside the box” as we anticipate the knowledge and skills for techs in emerging fields such as solar voltaics. From OP-TEC’s view, we are interested in solar voltaics because of the skills required in optics and electro-optics. But Solar Voltaic Techs (if there are to be such workers) will probably need a combination of knowledge/skills that include optics & electro-optics; but also may include technologies related to new batteries—and possibly other technologies.

Labels: batteries, renewable energy, green energy, solar energy, solar voltaics, optics, photonics, technicians