Planting the Seed

Classrooms are full of up-to-date machinery that was purchased with money allocated to the school from the Commonwealth of Virginia due to the relationship and the growth of Rolls-Royce in the area or donated by Rolls-Royce. To promote the school and the technical side of the industry, the school offers tours to local high school students, and the glass doors invite the young students to see what is going on in the classrooms, building excitement on what is available to them.

On the job training

FedEx Express not only looks to the community when attracting tomorrow’s AMTs to the profession, but also provides opportunities inside the company for current employees. It has a “Maintenance Trainee Program” (MTP) for its employees who have acquired their Airframe and Powerplant licenses but have not acquired the three years of experience needed to qualify to become a FedEx Express AMT. The rigorous MTP program pairs trainees with management as well as tenured AMT mentors who show them the ropes in an intensive, three-year program at the end of which trainees join the ranks of full-fledged AMTs. This allows FedEx to retain its own talented employees.

The solutions vary according to industry needs and local resources but there are solutions being implemented to create the next generation of aircraft mechanics.