An instructor addresses a class at the new RV Technical Institute along Middlebury Street in Elkhart Monday. The facility will focus on providing training for recreational vehicle service technicians. AIMEE AMBROSE | THE GOSHEN NEWS
ELKHART — A new program in Elkhart County aims to put more highly trained technicians to work at fixing recreational vehicles with mechanical issues.
A ribbon-cutting ceremony marked the opening of the RV Technical Institute in Elkhart Monday. The center at 3333 Middlebury St. is the product of a collaborative investment by RV manufacturers, industry members and dealers to address a need for workers skilled at servicing the vehicles.
“We’re created to help serve the shortage of trained technicians within the RV industry with a goal of really improving the consumer experience,” said Curtis Hemmeler, executive director of the RV Technical Institute.
Focusing more on repairing RVs rather than manufacturing RVs, the school will serve as a resource for current techs to improve their skills and as a gateway to help recruit new workers into the industry.
Goals include increasing the number of certified techs — 27 percent of the existing RV technician workforce is certified, Hemmeler noted — and speeding up the repair and servicing process, a key need in maintaining customer satisfaction. Hemmeler said RV owners have to wait about three weeks on average to get their vehicles fixed.
“Our goal is to obviously continue to chip away at that and make that better by training technicians through a very structured and standardized curriculum that doesn’t exist today,” he said.
Hemmeler would like to cut the wait time by half over the next couple years with more certified technicians able to better diagnose vehicle issues. Hemmeler said RV manufacturers and suppliers are also working to deliver parts quicker and more efficiently.
The RVTI offers a standardized curriculum developed through a learning management system that can be delivered online. That means dealerships or independent shops nationwide can have service techs trained where they are, or vocational schools and community colleges could partner with RVTI to offer the material, according to Hemmeler.
The training also includes a hands-on component, bolstering the academic side for workers preparing for certification testing.
“They’re going to have to prove their competency not just by taking a test, but also by being able to perform the test,” Hemmeler said. “The students will have to be able to be both book-smart and hand-smart.”
RVTI has classrooms to provide academic and hands-on learning. The school will also train instructors who could then deliver the material to students at other locations.
In one example, Hemmeler described how dealerships and dealership networks could send representatives in to do the instructor training and then go back to teach staff the curriculum. Another idea he suggested would be to recruit aging or retiring technicians who’d be willing to travel to sites and provide in-person training to younger workers.
A so-called “Train the Trainer” class was underway at the RVTI facility Monday before the ribbon-cutting ceremony was held.
The education isn’t limited to experienced technicians. The institute will offer training to people of all skill levels from various walks of life as it seeks to help recruit workers into the RV industry, according to Hemmeler. One plan calls for reaching out to local high schools to build interest among youths in technical work. RVTI will operate as a non-profit organization, created through a $10 million grant. The funding came from a collaboration of sources including manufacturers, members of the RV Industry Association and the RV Dealers Association, Hemmeler said.
The school, following renovation work, opened in the former Indiana Tech building along Middlebury Street. Features include 18,000-square-feet of space, with about 10,000 square feet utilized mostly for offices and seven classrooms, Hemmeler said. A large bay takes up the other 8,000 square feet at the back of the building. With an 18-foot-high ceiling, the bay can hold various types of RVs to aid in hands-on training.
© 2024 Community Newspaper Holdings, Inc.