Ronnie McBride’s fired up about Columbus Tech’s renovated welding lab

Ronnie McBride certainly will be celebrating Tuesday with the grand opening of the welding program lab at Columbus Technical College. After all, he’s seen the facilities in much worse condition.

“It was like a blast from the past (before) when you walked out in the shop,” the Columbus native said. “It was kind of like you were walking into ‘Sweat Hogs,’ an old high school movie in the ’70s. But now it’s totally redone, new lockers, everything. New electrical all the way out. They even replaced electrical boxes that were on the wall.”

That major renovation, McBride said, has brought a dramatically improved atmosphere for those taking the welding courses at the school, some looking for a career, some just wanting a bit of knowledge into how to craft things with a welding torch in their garages.

“It’s brand new,” he said. “We’ll walk around out here and I’ll show you. It’s the nicest welding lab I’ve ever seen, and I’ve seen a lot of them, in other states, too.”

McBride, 39, has plenty reason to be proud. He’s the welding program director and lead instructor, a job he has held since 2009 after starting work part-time five years earlier as an adjunct instructor.

Welding, for those unaware, is a solid career for nearly 400,000 people across the United States, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. The median annual pay in 2015 was $38,150 for an occupation that doesn’t require a degree, but some steady course time and hard work on the job perfecting their craft and gaining valuable experience. It also is a growing field, with the BLS estimating there will be a need for 14,400 more welders by the year 2024.

The Ledger-Enquirer visited with McBride at the welding lab recently to discuss the overhaul of the facilities, his job running the program, and what students ultimately can achieve with their time spent in the Columbus Tech program. This interview is edited a bit for length and clarity.

Q. How many students are taking the welding course?

A. I would say about 60 to 70 at a time. We do day and night classes, four days a week and four nights a week.

Q. Is that a healthy number?

A. That’s a real good healthy number. You’ve got to have the space and a welding machine. It’s not like a math class where you can put 30 people in a seat, or 40 if you can fit them in the room. They’ve actually got to have a machine or piece of equipment to work with. So you’re kind of limited on your numbers from that aspect.

Q. Is welding a strong career path, a growth career?

A. It’s a good career. Most of the high-paying jobs are going to be out of town in construction and things like that. But as you get the building built or the bridge built or the (nuclear) reactor built, you have to move somewhere else, but those jobs pay real big. Around here in town, guys coming out of the program and just starting out, probably make 10 or 12 bucks an hour, maybe 15 at some of these bigger places around here. Caterpillar in LaGrange is one that’s hiring some of the welders; Industrial Metal Fabricators around town; Cotton Custom Metals.

But it don’t have to be a welding facility where they’re actually making something. Some place might need a maintenance guy that has equipment that breaks a lot. There’s all different types of jobs you can get with welding.

There’s some people who make over $100,000 a year. Now it’s rough work. Somebody on a bridge job, you’ve got to figure you’re hanging out over water, probably cold or hot, and scary. There’s some stuff involved with that.

Q. So there are some local and regional opportunities, but people can go even farther?

A. They move on, move to California or Maine. Some of the students I talk to are in Maine now, just doing different things. Work for the railroad or shipyard or somewhere other than here. But they learned the trade here, maybe perfected it at one of these places around town, and moved on.

Q. How did you get into it?

A. As a kid, I got a job at Triple-B Truck Body. I came in just cutting door panels and cutting steal parts for them to use. They may have been slack one day and needed a welder so they started training me how to weld on the job. I got a job over there making beer trailers, beverage trailers, utility bodies and things of that nature.

Then I got a job at U-Haul at night doing repairs. They needed a body guy and someone who could do aluminum Mig welding real good. And my manager wanted me to go to school for it. So I started coming here in the late ’90s or early 2000s. When I completed the program here they asked me if I could teach part-time. I started doing that and one guy quit, one guy retired. I had been here awhile with the students, so I applied for the (program director) job and got it.

Q. What do you like about your job?

A. This job here, I get to work with the public and help people, see people who’s doing bad sometimes and bring ’em to good. I like working with people in the community and giving back.

Q. Is welding hard to do?

A. I guess it would be hard for someone starting out. But for me I’ve got accustomed to it over the 20 years I’ve been working with it. I’ve got good dexterity with it, good hand-eye coordination. You’ve got to have that to even do it. Some people get out of it because they don’t have the hand-eye coordination. I like making things and having the ability to fix things. And then here, I’ve got the added bonus of helping students learn to weld, seeing them come back (to visit) and have gotten jobs and are doing it for a living.

Q. Is welding a real physical job?

A. Sure it is. You’re carrying heavy metal and you’re grinding and a lot of times you’re outside. But some of the things people used to have to pick up (by hand) back in the day, they’re picking up with cranes now. So if it’s a big giant part, you really don’t have to worry about the lifting factor. I keep about five or six females in the program at a time (on average), and they get jobs.

Q. What’s a typical day like for you?

A. I’m back and forth. I’ll be out on the floor (instructing) and then I may have to come in here to look something up or take a phone call, then back out on the floor. I may have a big group in the back metal fabricating a part or I may have them singled out in the booths. They get a sheet of welding tasks that they have to turn in and they just go down the list and weld it out. It’s kind of self-paced. So if they’re having trouble with a task they come and get me and I’ll run it a couple of times, or watch them run it and tell them things they may be doing wrong — turn up your heat a little more, change your angle on the rod, or whatever.

Q. How long does it take to get through the course?

A. It depends. We have three certificates of completion. During a 15-week semester we do two 15 weeks and a 10. You can knock one of those certificates out in a semester if you came all day and at night maybe. The diploma normally takes about a year and a half if you come full time like you’re supposed to. And then you have an option to go into an associate’s degree with the courses that you’ve gotten.

Q. Military people take classes here. Are they leaving the service?

A. Some people are leaving the service. Some people are in. It’s different situations. But we have a lot of active military take the courses. I guess maybe they’re planning for when they’re about to get out, or it’s something that helps them in (the military), or maybe it’s something they want to know for the garage, you know. Some guys are older and retired and they’re not looking for a living, but they want something to do at the house. So they’ll come take a couple of courses here, buy a (welding) machine, and do art stuff or something like that at their house.

Q. What do you enjoy the most about your job, just getting out on the floor with the students?

A. I do. Yeah, yeah, I don’t like the paperwork stuff. (smiles) It’s something that’s got to be done when you’re working with this amount of people. You’ve got timesheets. Right now we’ve got two full-time (instructors) and a part-time guy and we’re looking for another part-time guy.

Q. You’re looking for steady growth in student numbers?

A. I think they’re going to be steady, for sure. When I first took the job full-time in 2009, I think we had about 45 or 50 students (at a time), and now we’ve got 60 or 70 students.

Q. What’s the most challenging aspect of being an instructor?

A. I want to help everybody, and sometimes it’s frustrating when you can’t get to some of the people. You talk to them and tell them what they need and sometimes they just don’t get the message or maybe they don’t care. Maybe they’re not here for the right reason or something. But I would say the worst thing about it is not being able to help everyone, seeing people not succeed when you’ve tried your hardest.

Q. Discuss briefly the the improved welding lab?

A. Everything was repainted, the floors, wall, ceiling, everything. The booths were taken out. We had 28 booths before that were probably made in the late ’70s. The ventilation system was old. It was from 1991, I think. It was taken out and all new ventilation put inside of the booths. New welders. New air conditioners. The classroom, the office, the lab out here, the lab in the back are all on different independent systems because of the smoke and stuff like that, the contamination. New lighting. Everything, man.

This story was originally published February 25, 2017 at 3:16 PM with the headline "Ronnie McBride’s fired up about Columbus Tech’s renovated welding lab."