In celebration of Manufacturing Month-here’s an exciting opportunity to help start your career in manufacturing.

Moraine Park is helping combat the skilled worker shortage by providing skill development through the Manufacturing Skills Academy.

This program, also known as manufacturing boot camps, offers the opportunity to explore a unique career pathway. The manufacturing boot camp is a 3-month training program in either CNC Machining or welding. During the program, you are part of a paid internship with a local employer. This means you’ll be paid while you learn! At the end of the program, you’ll have a college certificate and, in most cases, the opportunity to turn your internship into a full-time career.

Your first step toward your new career begins at our information sessions this November– offered both in-person and online. Here, you’ll learn about each career, meet the instructors and get the next step enrollment information.

One more great feature, Moraine Park’s boot camp programs are tuition-free. The tuition and materials costs are covered completely by grants and community support.

No previous manufacturing experience is necessary and there are no income limitations.

So, what are you waiting for? Space in the program is limited- sign up for your information session today to get started!

Information sessions are on Nov. 9 at the Fond du Lac campus and Nov. 17 online. Registration is required and information can be found here.

More information on Moraine Park’s boot camps can be found here.

Nikki Dahlke is the new Recruitment and Advising Specialist for the boot camps in the Economic and Workforce Development Department. In her role, she will actively recruit students interested in participating in the short term manufacturing boot camps as well as support the current students attending them.

She comes to MPTC from a collaborative program between Goodwill Industries and Fox Valley Technical College where she was a Financial Coach for the Oshkosh FVTC students doing 1-1 financial counseling as well as classroom workshops to teach money management. Prior to that she worked at Fox Cities Habitat for Humanity for 4 years as the Family Services Coordinator and is still involved there as the Chair of their Family Selection Committee.

Nikki has spent her career working in non-profit case management and is looking forward to the opportunity to use those skills to help support students’ success at MPTC.

Nikki earned her Bachelors’ degrees from UW River Falls in Communicative Disorders and in Spanish. She is fully bilingual in Spanish and taught English in Mexico for a few years following college. She enjoys traveling to places off the beaten path and spending time with her husband and son.

“I am excited to continue to make a difference in the community by helping remove barriers to employment. These boot camps provide an incredible opportunity for students to gain skills, knowledge, and connections to a workplace through the internship. I look forward to working with the MPTC family in giving a hand up to people through these manufacturing boot camps.”

Interested in learning more about our boot camp opportunities, visit
https://www.morainepark.edu/services/business-and-industry/bootcamp/ .

Reading and hearing about new career opportunities is helpful. But what if you actually could try them out as well? Moraine Park Technical College is offering a unique opportunity to do just that with its “Test Drive” workshops for welding and computerized numerical control (CNC). Continue reading

Reading and hearing about new career opportunities is helpful. But what if you actually could try them out as well? Moraine Park Technical College is offering a unique opportunity to do just that with its “Test Drive” workshops for welding and computerized numerical control (CNC). Continue reading

Alex Bertram didn’t really need to find something new. He spent his days at his job at a car wash, and he was okay with it. Then his mom started talking about boot camps, and then his girlfriend started talking about boot camps, and suddenly he started thinking about boot camps as something he should actually do. “I’ve been washing cars for the past two years,” said Bertram, “and I just think I was going nowhere. I got a dollar raise in a year of working there. Now that I’m here I feel like I’m always moving forward. I’m always learning something. There are so many opportunities that I have with this thing and it’s free. You get paid. You get a job – well, you could get a job, you have the opportunity to go get that for yourself.” Continue reading

Cole Strassman is going to be a welder. In fact, it seems he already is, and probably what he would have been if he had never met us. The beauty of the boot camps is that it can take you where you want to go, even if you’re already on your way. Continue reading

Congratulations! From left to right in back row: Dean Kristen Finnel, Toni Post – Fond du Lac, Alan Martinez-Luna – Fond du Lac, Louise Zenner – Malone, Ashley Lewis – West Bend, Instructor Karrie Bruegman-May. Front row: Jennifer Kikendall – Waupun, Briana Gens – Fond du Lac, Nhia Yang – Beaver Dam, and Angela Clark – Beaver Dam.

From March 27 – April 13, at the Beaver Dam Campus, 9 more students successfully completed Moraine Park Technical College’s Nursing Assistant (CNA) boot camp–a rigorous three-week, 120 hour, 3 credit, learning experience. Students spent their clinical hours training at Hillside Manor in Beaver Dam, an MPTC community partnership through Beaver Dam Community Hospital. Continue reading

Welding is fun for Alex Rocha, so fun, in fact, that when the end of class is called, Rocha, a Welding Boot Camp student, wants more. “When I’m done with class, I want to say, ‘Wait! I’m done already?’” and amazingly, that love of welding is only one part of what motivates him to succeed in the boot camps.

Rocha’s young daughter motivates him. The opportunity to meet new people that can teach him new skills and share life experiences motivates him. And most of all, his past motivates him: This includes a two-year incarceration that led him to our boot camps.

“I don’t mind talking about it because it’s the past. I’m here now and my future has endless possibilities because I’m here right now. That’s my motivation.” Continue reading

For Dylan Feutz, hard work has always been the easy part. When he graduated from high school in 2011, he chose the low-cost path. “The only reason I never went to college after high school is because I didn’t want to pay for it,” said Feutz, “I just planned on just working hard and making money.” Over the years in the workforce, he’s held jobs in food service and manufacturing, but something drove him to want more. Continue reading