California expanding EV education as Michigan, other states move ahead
Woodland Hills, Calif. — Derek Crawford has been servicing cars for two years at the Galpin Ford Dealership in Los Angeles while learning about electric vehicles as he works toward an associate degree in automotive engineering and science from Los Angeles Pierce College.
Crawford has some experience with electric vehicles, since about half of the Ford vehicles he works on use electricity to power them. He learned on the job by reading and studying online manuals, trial and error, and asking a lot of questions of his colleagues.
While studying at Pierce College, Crawford recently had an epiphany when he took an advanced electronics class.
“I should have taken this class earlier, but I am taking it now so I can apply it,” said Crawford, a Santa Monica resident. “In every single car, there is going to be electrical work. It is one of the key foundations in a car.”
As Michigan prepares its own workforce for electrification, California is facing a more specific deadline — a state mandate that by 2035, all new passenger vehicles sold will be zero emissions. California also has 1.2 million electric vehicles registered, the most in the nation, according to federal data. California officials said workers need training to gain skills in building and servicing EVs.
Other states are also moving ahead with EV education, including Tennessee, Kentucky and Georgia, either because of laws passed to reach zero emissions or battery plants that are in the region.
More:Born in California, Tesla technician training spreading to Midwest
More:EVs aren’t going away. Here’s how Michigan is preparing its workforce
In June, for example, the Tennessee College of Applied Technology at Stanton opened on the site of Blue Oval City where Ford Motor Co. plans to build a $5.6 billion EV and battery assembly plant.
Two years ago in California, Los Angeles Pierce College opened the Advanced Automotive Technology Building, a $22 million automotive technology center envisioned 15 years ago to train students to work on zero-emission vehicles.
Pierce College’s new building reflects increased investments in education and training programs for alternative fuel vehicles. It comes as the state is working to comply with the California Air Resources Board’s rules adopted in 2022 after Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom’s executive order two years earlier that called for the elimination of new passenger vehicle sales with internal combustion engines by 2035.
At the time, the edict was the most aggressive in the nation aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions and improving the environment, economy and public health. Since then, 12 other states and the District of Columbia have adopted similar policies, but Michigan is not among them.
Even as incoming President-elect Donald Trump has vowed to put the brakes on the transition to EVs nationwide, there are numerous reasons why Michigan has been reticent, from local automakers’ concerns with regulatory compliance to political arguments that EV mandates will raise prices and amount to an attack on the traditional automotive industry.
Even so, like California, Michigan is moving ahead in enhancing and expanding post-secondary education curriculums across the state to prepare the workforce with the skills needed to work on electric vehicles.
In California, dozens of courses are currently offered for training in gas-electric hybrid and alternative fuel technologies within the state’s community college system, said Melissa Villarin, spokesperson for the California Community Colleges Chancellor’s Office.
West Los Angeles College is home to the CA Center for Climate Change Education, Villarin said, and training is offered at four-year institutions along with the California Department of Labor and Department of Energy.
“The governor has laid out an ambitious climate action plan,” Villarin said. “In order to help the state reach its goals, an educated and well-trained workforce is needed. That’s where the California Community Colleges comes in. We are uniquely positioned to address climate workforce needs. With 116 colleges serving 2 million students, our colleges’ scope and reach, their accessible pathways to economic mobility and skilled training … make them ideal hubs for innovative workforce initiatives.”
Pierce College’s Advanced Automotive Technology Building features three automotive double bay laboratories designed to teach students in the areas of alternative fuel, advanced diagnostics, and hybrid and electric vehicle technologies.
Voters approved a bond in 2008 for the new building at Pierce College, one of the nine colleges that makes up the Los Angeles Community College District north of the city in the San Fernando Valley. The 21,233-square-foot complex opened in October 2022.
“One of the biggest challenges we faced in the planning of the building was trying to plan for the future,” said Alex Villalta, chair of Pierce College’s Industrial Technology Department and one of the contributors to the design of the building.
“The vision was to make sure we would be able to offer advanced instruction for vehicles of the future.”
The new building features specialty lifts for use with electric vehicles so students can remove battery packs from underneath without any obstruction. There are sections of the building for the temperature-controlled storage of vehicle batteries.
Pierce College President Ara Aguiar called the building “one of a kind” in the state.
One of the first alternative auto programs in California to train students began in 2000 at Rio Hondo College in Whittier, outside of Los Angeles, said John Frala, a professor in alternative fuels as well as electric and fuel cell vehicles.
The college began offering its first courses to work on vehicles running on biofuels, which helps reduce emissions. Rio Hondo College then became one of the first community colleges in the nation to offer an associate degree in alternative fuels in 2016, Frala said. A year later, Rio Hondo became home to the second training program in the nation at a community college to train students to work on Tesla cars. A bachelor’s degree program in automotive technology followed in 2018.
“Everybody thought I was nuts. Everyone said electric vehicles were a fad,” said Frala, who came to the college in 1989 after working for General Motors in California for 21 years as a technical service specialist.
Rio Hondo College is a big part of California’s history to provide education and training for a pipeline of workers for vehicles using alternative fuels, he said.
“I was one of the first instructors that accepted the technology,” Frala said. “I am as excited today as when I started the program because I am actually seeing electric vehicles catch on.”
Students are enrolling in the programs in hopes of blazing trails in a field that they see as the future.
Among them is Thanh Nguyen, who enrolled in his 40s at Rio Hondo College to earn an associate degree in alternative fuels, an electric vehicles certificate and a bachelor’s degree in automotive technology. He has since landed a position at Rivian Automotive, an electric trucks and SUV company based in South Carolina.
Nguyen pursued his education after working in the logistical trucking industry in office jobs most of his life. He admitted that it was not easy working toward a new career later in life. But he said he chased his passion and sees promise in his future.
“The industry is exploding,” Nguyen said, “and I want to be one of the first people to learn all the technology.”
This story was funded in part by a media fellowship from the Institute for Citizens and Scholars, with support from the ECMC Foundation, to increase journalists’ tools for reporting on postsecondary education, particularly career and technical education.
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