Nassau Bay Hilton, Nassau Bay, TX
Date: Friday,
January 31, 2003
Time: 9:00
am – 1:00 pm
Steve Erickson, Executive Director, opened the
meeting and welcomed everyone in attendance.
Steve introduced Lisa Arnold as the new GCPTA Secretary and
informed everyone that Mike Gragg, the GCPTA Treasurer, was not able
to make the meeting due to business commitments.
The participants introduced themselves.
There were 50 members and guests in attendance.
The
following members were approved by the steering committee.
Voting—
Dr. Charles Thomas, Lee College, Baytown,
TX
Frances Toney, PPG, Lake Charles, LA
Mike Cobb, College of the Mainland, Texas City, TX
Non-Voting—
Bryan Taylor, Basell USA, Inc., Lake Charles, LA
Vibhu Sharma, Ingenious, Inc., Houston, TX
Linda Jones-Zbranek, Lee College Fieldbus Center, Baytown, TX
Jerry Duncan, College of the Mainland, Texas City, TX
Executive Directors Report – Steve
Erickson
– reported that he became the Executive Director of the GCPTA
December 2, 2002. He
reported that the GCPTA is sponsoring an Industrial Technology
Summer Institute for High School Females with the help of CAPT. The
decision on location will be made at the Executive Committee meeting
this afternoon. Steve
reminded everyone of the Career Expo that is scheduled for February
21, 2003 at San Jacinto College—Central Campus at no cost to
participants. He encouraged everyone to participate.
Ed
Stiles, from the floor, reminded all in attendance that the Career
Expo was indeed a worthwhile endeavor even if their companies were
not presently hiring. He
reminded all that the value of the Career Expo is to show support
for process technology education to keep the company name before
potential candidates for hire and to encourage high quality
candidates to continue their education in process technology because
the jobs are going to be available in the future.
Steve
reported that he attended the IICTA and obtained good information
and ideas that could be useful for the GCPTA.
Steve
said that he would like to start attending all GCPTA Subcommittee
meetings and would contact the chairperson for dates and times of
their next meetings.
Steve
solicited help from GCPTA membership in notifying him of potential
participants in the GCPTA. He
also requested ideas and information for improvement of the efforts
of the GCPTA.
Subcommittee
– Funding – Stacey Chiasson
– reported that the Funding Committee were looking at the goals of
the GCPTA and had asked the chairpersons of the other committees to
submit their funding needs and goals to them.
She reported that subscription requests from the GCPTA would
be mailed out the following week.
Subcommittee
on Public Relations – Bill Raley –
Bill reported that they had not had a meeting because of business
commitments; therefore there was nothing new to report at this time.
Gary reported
that the Education Subcommittee was working towards the development
of an Instrumentation Textbook for process technology.
Gary reported
that Gregg Curry had introduced a meeting suggestion document for
conducting meetings. It
has been posted on the Website for use.
Gary reported
that Brazosport College would be hosting two Summer Faculty
Institutes, an introductory course the week of June the 9th
and an advanced course the week of July 14th .
These courses are being co-sponsored by CAPT and the ACS.
The next
Education Subcommittee meeting is scheduled for February 28, 2003.
Teleconferencing is available.
NSF
Update – Joanna Kile
– Joanna made an
announcement that Leslie Hunt, the CAPT Curriculum Director, had
accepted a new position with Eastman Chemical in Kingsport,
Tennessee.
Joanna gave
the following slide presentation:
Curriculum
Activities
·
Piloting Oil
and Gas Production I
·
Developing
Oil and Gas Production II
·
Early Phases
of Instrumentation Textbook Development
ü
ESC provided
input for content emphasis (DIF) tool
ü
Tool to be
sent via email to ESC members on 2/3/03 and returned by 2/28/03
Professional
Development Activities
·
CIBP
Conference at South Shore Harbour on 10/9 – 10/10/03
·
Two One-Week
Faculty Summer Institutes at Brazosport College
ü
Introductory
Institute – June 9
ü
Advanced
Institute – July 14
·
Student
Internships and Scholarships
Application
deadline April 1
Capacity
Building Activities
·
Mentor
Program
ü
Bellingham
Technical College in WA
ü
Calhoun
Community College in AL
ü
Los Angeles
Trade Technical College in CA
·
Industrial
Technology Summer Institute for High School Females
Capacity
Building Activities
Educational
Partners:
ü
Brazosport
College
ü
College of
the Mainland
ü
Del Mar
College
ü
Delaware
Technical and Community College
ü
Joliet
Junior College
ü
McNeese
State University
ü
Montana
State University
ü
Southwestern
Illinois College
ü
TSTC
ü
University
of Alaska
ü
University
of Virgin Islands
ü
Victoria
College
Dissemination
of Activities
·
Trends in
Process Technology Education Report now available
on
Website or for purchase
·
Student
Success Stories Publication now available on website
or
for purchase
Skill
Standards Activities
·
Work-Oriented
Validation Complete
·
Academic and
Employability Knowledge and
Skills
Collection
·
Occupational/Technical
Knowledge and
Skills
Collection
For
further information…
Joanna Kile
CAPT at
College of the Mainland
1200 Amburn
Road
Texas City,
Texas 77591
(409)
938-1211, x101
Ø
The new
Baseline Survey on Student Information from our partners is
available in PDF form on the CAPT Website or it can be ordered from
CAPT for $5.00 a copy.
Ø
The Student
Success Stories can be ordered through CAPT at a cost of $4.00 a
copy. The forms for
ordering both are on the CAPT Website.
Ø
Everyone who
contributed to these publications will get a copy mailed to them.
Ø
Joanna
provided CAPT’s Student Success Stories booklet to all the
attendees at the meeting.
Ø
The Critical
Issues and Best Practices Conference will be held at South Shore
Harbour Resort and Conference Center in League City on October 9
& 10, 2003.
Special
Note – Misty Yarotsky with Offshore Energy Center/Oceanstar Museum
talked about the “Knowledge Box” which contains learning and
instruction tools and information about the oil industry and
offshore and onshore drilling.
She made it known that they had several boxes out at partner
colleges and that the boxes were available to be shipped to
institutions to help students learn about the oil industry.
This is a free exhibit that is on loan to the school for a
month. A question was
asked from the floor if it could be shipped to Louisiana and other
states. She said she
would investigate that possibility.
Subcommittee
on Standards & Quality – Ed Stiles referred back to the slides that he and Kathy had presented at
the November 1, 2002 meeting that outlined the standards that the
GCPTA had set for endorsed and recommended colleges.
He reminded everyone that the audit process reports and the
college advisory committee lists were due by the end of the Spring
semester 2003. If
anyone is having trouble getting started, contact Kathy or Ed and
they will help.
Kathy
explained that the Audit process is a helpful tool to help
strengthen programs.
Financial
Report – Ed Stiles
– reported that in 2002, Expenses were $47,413.22 and Income was
$56,589.98. The bank
balance at the end of December 2002 was $47,053.79.
Anyone wishing to review these figures should contact Mike
Gragg.
College
Advisory Committees
·
Baton
Rouge Community College – Kathy Trahan
reported the following: They
have had a great fall semester.
In the fall 2002 semester, they had 258 students enrolled, an
increase of almost 90 students.
They interned 5 new students with Dow Chemical and Shell
Chemical and these companies are continuing to keep several interns
working at their facility. This
spring 2003 enrollment is currently at 281, an increase from the
fall with 94 students (36 Tech-Prep) enrolled in PTEC101.
Eight new intern positions are currently being filled for
this spring. Rhodia has
agreed to place two interns for the summer 2003. They continue to partner with industry in the area.
Formosa, ExxonMobil, Placid Refining, Georgia Gulf, Shell
Chemical, Chevron Phillips, Dow Chemical, Formosa Plastics, Vulcan
and Rhodia have all contributed personnel time, scholarships, or
internships. Their
graduates continue to be hired by Shell, Placid AtaFina, Dow, and
ExxonMobil.
Baton
Rouge Community College’s Advisory Board meets every other month.
They have 2 new members on the Advisory Board from Morgan
City Oil and Gas.
Kathy
brought a guest, John Toups, who demonstrated The Pocket Toolbox for
PTEC students concentrating on safety.
He gave a demonstration on Safety Coach, which delivers
safety messages off the web.
·
Louisiana
Technical College–Ascension Parish – Cleve Marchand – reported their advisory committee is meeting once a month.
They have seven or eight industry people on their committee.
They also the school board president on the committee.
They have 15 total Advisory members.
·
Victoria
College – Anita Riley – reported
the number of enrolled majors as follows:
Fall 2001—119, Spring 2002—110, Fall 2002—75.
Number of Graduates as follows:
Fall 2001—14, Spring 2002—12, Summer 2002—4, Fall 2002—8.
The following Co-ops were reported:
Summer 2002—1 at BP plant, 1 with BP offshore, Fall 2002—4
at DuPont, Spring 2003—3 at DuPont, 1 at BP plant, 2 at Formosa
Plastics. Anita
reported that they are developing an Instructor Guide for Laboratory
courses and it will contain laboratory exercises for all PTAC
courses. They are also developing an Industrial Processes
course to replace their Mechanical Skills course.
·
Del Mar
College – Dee Salmon
– reported that they do have an Advisory Committee, which had met
last month. Dee reported that the State Project will pilot test
13 modules this semester with an on-line field test next Fall. They will hold a Problem Base Program for teams of
faculty in math and science communications August 6, 7 & 8 at
Del Mar College.
·
Lamar
Institute of Technology – Ronnie Baker – reported
that Lamar Institute of Technology had dedicated a $700,000
distillation plant in November.
The three-story unit was designed by Testingeer Engineering
of Bay City. It will be used to provide real life, hands-on
experience to students in a number of industrial fields, including
process technology. The
plant will allow students to distill glycol from water.
Other practical exercises are a part of the plan, which is
totally outdoors.
The
Institute awarded 96 associate of applied science degrees to
students majoring Process Technology during the 2002 college year. It graduated 40 students in December, and there are
50 candidates for graduation in May.
The
Spring enrollment at LIT is 318.
The Institute has a one-plus-one agreement with Lamar State
Colleges in Orange and Port Arthur, where students may take the
first year of the Process Technology curriculum and matriculate to
LIT for the last two semesters.
LIT
also has articulation agreements with the Beaumont Independent
School District’s Taylor Career Center and with Little
Cypress-Mauriceville Consolidated Independent School District to
offer process courses to high school students.
·
Brazosport
College – Gary Hicks –
reported that they had an Advisory Committee meeting that Monday.
He announced that Robert Rodgers with Dow Chemical is
retiring. They are
offering four classes in the area high schools with 40 students
enrolled. Phillips has
donated equipment for an instrumentation lab at Sweeney and also six
scholarships for Sweeney High School.
BASF has donated two scholarships.
·
Texas
State Technical College – Martha McKinley –
reported TSTC has 27 students enrolled for the Spring semester.
Four students will graduate at the end of this semester.
They have two students on Co-op for the Spring semester at
Eastman Chemical. Their Co-op Program was built on Mike Kukuk’s
research.
·
Louisiana
Technical College-Sowela Campus – Clarence Hughes – reported they had 33 graduates this fall, plus 18 that
graduated in May 2002, for a total of 51 for 2002.
They predict fifty to sixty graduates per year.
Their job placement rate so far is about 50%. Current enrollment is about 183—150 at the Sowela
Campus and another 33 in three local high schools.
The chemicals for their plants A-B-C&D have been coming
in and should be complete over the next two weeks.
Their plant F has been installed, but has not been
commissioned, and plant E is under construction.
Clarence
reported that Linton LeCompte had gone into four high school
classrooms and talked to the students about PTEC.
From this, 15 students enrolled in PTEC at Louisiana
Technical College-Sowela. Clarence
says this is the way to go for recruitment—principals and
counselors is not the way to recruit.
·
Wharton
County Junior College – John Poland –
reported that Wharton has 25 students, which was down from the
previous semester of 35 students.
They had a total of two graduates last year.
·
College
of the Mainland – Mike Cobb & Jerry Duncan – reported they have 400 PTEC students.
They have 80 new students enrolled this Spring.
Their PTEC’s new (used) 6 foot glass distillation column
donated by BP has had a major portion of its support structure
rebuilt and has been re-installed.
The Teflon seals on the vessels have apparently dried out and
will have to be replaced. Plans
are to replace the old analog temperature recorder with a new
digital recorder and to also replace all of the old existing thermo
couples. They are anxiously awaiting the completion of this
project.
They
continue to improve the operation of the Glycol Separation Unit.
Their latest project is to replace the feed and product drums
with a single circulation tank. This will allow longer runs with consistent feed
compositions.
They
have several new PTEC instructors this semester—Lew Cresswell,
Steve Wethington and John McGraw.
And, George “Woody” Anderson is back teaching at PTEC.
Welcome aboard Guys!
·
McNeese
State University – Bernie Newman – reported
the following: Greetings
from Bayou Country, where alligators, oil wells, and cattle coexist
side-by-side! McNeese
State University’s Process Plant Technology Associate Degree
program just celebrated its 11th year of existence.
They just graduated their 327th student in
December. They are
currently the only SACS (Southern Association of Colleges and
Schools) accredited two-year P-Tech programs in the state of
Louisiana.
The
Process Technology 2-year associates degree program just had an ABET
(Accrediting Board for Engineering and Technology) site visit in
November. They had a
very favorable evaluation. The
visitation team found no deficiencies, no weakness, 2 concerns (one
of which has already been implemented), and 2 suggestions.
They expect final accreditation approval in the Summer of
this year when the ABET board meets.
This will make them the SECOND Process Technology program
accredited by ABET in the United States.
McNeese will have the first Process Technology program in the
Gulf Coast area to be accredited by ABET!
The
local Lake Charles American Press ran an article in December
highlighting the $87,000 in grants received from the H.C. Drew
Endowment Fund and TASC (Technological Advancement for Students
Committee) for the Process Plant Technology program.
Computer software, cut-aways and models of process equipment
were purchased with these funds that will allow students to receive
hands-on experience before they graduate.
·
San Juan
College – Tony Otero – reported
they have 61 students enrolled.
They have 13 fourth semester students, 11 third semester
students, 17 second semester students and 20 first semester
students. Six of their
students have obtained jobs at local power plant and gas processing.
Their first graduating group will be May 2003.
They will graduate 15-20 students approximately every 4
months beginning with May 2003.
They
have Modules A-F, Boiler Turbine Generator Cooling Tower System,
Water Lab, Tool Room, PC Lab, 2 classrooms, 2 instructors and 1
adjunct instructor.
In
less than one year, they moved from the main campus into their
present location, started four different semester groups, purchased
all of the Process Modules, completed engineering aspects, modules
were delivered and installed, started-up, and are currently using
the modules in their program.
Their
Advisory group consists of PNM, APS, Williams Energy, Giant
Refinery, and BP.
·
Montana
State University – Bob Robertus –
reported the following: PPL
Montana has approached the MSU-Billings College of Technology (COT)
about offering a Power Plant Operator option to their current
curriculum. They are predicting high attrition (retirement)
rates from both their coal-fired plants and hydroelectric facilities
in Montana for the next seven years.
The COT has submitted a proposal to them, which is currently
under review. If the proposal is approved, it would be a win-win
proposition for both the COT and PPL Montana.
The COT has also submitted a Congressional Appropriation
request to jump-start the program and pay for facility
modifications. That
request, too, is pending.
·
Alvin Community
College – Mark Demark –
reported the following: In
the Fall 2002, Alvin Community College assisted the GCPTA Education
Subcommittee by offering three new pilot process technology courses
developed by CAPT. These
courses were all in the area of Instrumentation e.g. PTAC-1352
Instrumentation I and PTAC-2436 Instrumentation II taught as regular
instructor lead courses and PTAC-1352 Instrumentation I taught as an
Internet Course by their Internet instructor specialist Ron Calvert.
This was a challenging and rewarding experience.
At the end, the ACC instructors and CAPT staff were able to
capture the best of this work which will be included in revised
instrumentation courses for the future.
ACC was able to justify taking on this additional
responsibility based on their experience with teaching the Internet
pilot Quality Course PTAC-2314.
ACC recommends that other colleges volunteer in piloting
process technology courses. ACC
will because they know it is truly a good teaching development
experience for all those involved in the effort.
Because of these experiences, ACC is offering a new CAPT
developed pilot process technology course proposed as Oil & Gas
Production I. This
course is identified as PTRT-1407 at ACC for the Spring and Summer
terms 2003. They hope
to offer a second course now being developed at CAPT as Oil &
Gas Production II in the Fall 2003.
ACC
enrollment has expanded and this Spring they were able to fill 16
PTAC core courses offered in both day and night venues.
As a part of the Oil & Gas pilot course, they were able
to take advantage of the generous offer by Simtronics to install
their new Oil & Gas Simulation software on their computers on a
trial basis.
Part-time
teaching staff at ACC now totals seven instructors. They were able to honor two instructors, Roy Caskey
and Lou Caserta, for 10 and 20 years of dedicated effort to Process
Technology education at their Spring Term college-wide kick off
meeting.
ACC
and BP, Chocolate Bayou Site, continue to work at developing a
viable student Co-op/Intern program.
This Spring, a student is working at the plant as a Co-op and
reporting back to the college classes with respect to the experience
gained. They believe
reporting back to the other students in the various other courses is
an important part of the Co-op program.
Acc
was privileged to offer one of their students, Mr. Paul Barron, a
Lubrizol Foundation Scholarship of $600 for the Spring Term 2003.
The
Alvin Community College Advisory Committee met at the college
Wednesday, February 19, 2003. Their
Advisory Committee serves both the Process Technology Department and
the Technical Programs of Continuing Education.
Members of the ACC Advisory Committee want to visit other
schools in their area to benchmark facilities.
Mark will be getting with the other schools within the next
few months to set up a meeting and tour.
·
Louisiana Report
– Stacey Chiasson –
reported the following: Louisiana
had a 40% increase in student enrollment statewide.
They hosted 4 more PTEC Academies this past Fall for high
school teachers and counselors.
They held 5 in the Fall of 2001 for a total of 9 academies
and close to 100 teachers/counselors impacted.
They are continuing to increase the amount of high school
seniors that are taking PTEC 101.
Last semester they had 4 high school programs that impacted
over 8 high schools. This
semester they have 7 programs that are impacting over 25 high
schools. In one parish
alone, Ascension Parish, they have increased PTEC scholarships from
$45,000 to $54,000…very successful.
They have logged over 100 calls on their PTEC 1-800 hotline.
They are able to document demographic information on their
callers. They have had
788 hits on their website since October.
They see the most activity after a PTEC Academy, which tells
them that teachers and students are using it.
They also sent the BP/DOW PTEC scholarship out to over 50
people in their PTEC database.
Special
Note—Mike Kukuk suggested
that perhaps graduating students should look at related fields for
employment. He
suggested terminal facilities, waterworks, and treatment plants.
New
Business – Steve Erickson
·
The GCPTA
Education and Career Expo is scheduled for Friday, February 21, 2003
at the San Jacinto College Central Campus.
A number of individuals stressed the importance of attendance
at this Career Fair both to support the GCPTA efforts and to provide
students access to possible future employers.
§
Website www.processtech.org
is fully active and maintained by Bob Kosar of Grand Isle Group
Information Delivery Specialists.
If your school or company has a Website and it is not
accessible by just a click, contact the Webmaster by e-mail bobkosar@hal-pc.org.
§
Center for the Advancement of Process Technology
(CAPT) Website www.captech.org.
§
Contact the GCPTA at atgcpta@msn.com.
Holiday Inn Express, Sulphur, LA
Friday, April 25, 2003
Nassau Bay, TX
Friday, July 25, 2003
Nassau Bay, TX
Friday, November 21, 2003
***Other Events***
Meeting adjourned at 1:00 p.m.
Respectfully submitted,
Lisa Arnold, Secretary
Gulf Coast Process Technology Alliance
LA/at