Anatoly Skobiak
Before NSCC
Anatoly Skobiak graduated from Roosevelt High School, Seattle in January of 1995, not knowing what he wanted to do with his life. Luckily, a family member steered him into the electronics field. He tried another local area vocational school, but found his way to North because of its reputation and location.
What North Does Best
He particularly appreciated the many guest speakers his instructors invited to class and the field trips and tours that graphically highlighted interesting career directions electronics graduates can aspire to. He liked the comprehensive class projects that yielded tangible results and the instructors who also work in their field and maintain good contacts in the industry. He was very pleased with the real world applications covered in class in addition to the theories behind them.
Hired Directly Out Of School
Encouraged by NSCC employment counselors to publish his resumé on the Internet, he received half a dozen offers within three days of posting. He was hired through a technical staffing agency in Bellevue and loves his interesting new job in a branch of the electronics industry he calls Automation Technology, testing manufactured boards, such as motherboards, modems and com modules for Hathaway Manufacturing.
Advice
Do your homework! North's classes accurately reflect workplace conditions and you can use them to test your interest and aptitude for your chosen program. Meet everyone in your class and build your network. Enjoy teamwork because that's what you'll find in the workplace. Go North is the best advice I can give!
Anatoly Skobiak
Dimne Cote
A Great Job... Except For Just One Little Thing
Dimne Cote earned an Industrial Engineering degree from a four-year university and graduated in 1983. She was a machinist for GE Aviation in Seattle from 1985 – 1994, manufacturing jet engine components. She was making good money, didn't get injured, enjoyed her work and was doing really well at it. So how did she wind up attending classes at North Seattle Community College? GE Aviation closed its Seattle plant, moving it to Turkey to cut costs. The North American Free Trade Agreement was in effect and under its provisions, she qualified for retraining. The Electronics program at North was highly recommended by many people in the Electrical industry as a great place to start a career in both the Electronics and Electrical industries.
Why She Went North
Counselors at North welcomed Dimne as an older student and North's Credit Evaluator accepted all of her 10-year-old credits from earlier studies. She set out to get a general education in electronics and specialize in the Electrical Power program.
In Demand
She was 1½ years into the 2-year Associate Degree program at North when she was invited by Seattle City Light to test for their apprenticeship program. She took a written test and passed it, then took a working test and passed that too, earning an interview. She passed the interview with flying colors as well and was hired into the city's four-year internship program in 1995.
Advice
Even though I didn't finish my original program, North Seattle Community College played an important role in my education. I wouldn't have gotten my apprenticeship without my training at North... Be motivated, be willing to learn, get mechanical experience, AC/DC circuitry experience and go North!"
Dimne Cote
Lavergne Bowhall
Defense is a good Offense
Before becoming associated with North Seattle Community College, Lavergne Bowhall was already a veteran of the electronics industry. While still in high school in Colorado, her first job was basic assembly work for Litton Industries Defense Systems. She set her heart on the graphic design industry, intending to enter that field after a move to Seattle in 1980, learning the hard way that graphics work was scarce for freelancers in the Seattle market at that time. She fell back on her electronics skills landing a job as an assembler at Honeywell Defense Systems in Ballard, where she worked for nearly ten years.
Honeywell comes through
Honeywell encouraged its employees to seek training and development by paying for further job-related education. Knowing she was capable of much more than simple assembly work, Lavergne began upgrading her skills in 1982, working full-time and attending school part-time, achieving four promotions in five years. She earned the titles of Manufacturing Test Technician, Senior Manufacturing Test Technician, Lead Manufacturing Test Technician and Lead Technician with Research and Development Emphasis over a 5-year period.
North's role in her progress
Honeywell paid for her education at North. She earned an Associate Degree of Applied Science in General Electronics from North in 1987, which qualified her for her last two promotion as Lead Technician and Lead Tech with R&D Emphasis.
Honeywell gives way to Quinton Instruments
The defense industry being what it is, even all her experience and expertise didn't exempt her job from re-organizations and spin-offs. Armed with her General Electronics degree, she bravely made the switch from defense to medical electronics in 1990. She got on at Quinton Instrument Company of Bothell, in the service department, doing customer support for return and repair of instruments.
Gabriel Lissade
Gabriel Lissade circumnavigated the globe at least three times before he came to North Seattle Community College. He was a Weapons Radar Electronics Technician in the Navy from 1982 to 1994, achieving the rank of E-6 First Class Petty Officer. Many years aboard pitching ships produced chronic knee problems for Gabriel and after a year of attempted rehabilitation by the Navy, he was down-sized with the overall reduction of the military and received his medical discharge in 1994.
20% = 4 years
The Veteran's Association designated him 20% disabled and qualified him for a four-year scholarship. He attended NSCC and WWU classes conducted at North in an attempt to combine programs from both schools and maximize his marketability.
Intel Outside
Late in 1994, he hired on at Intel in Portland as a clean-room quality control tech, monitoring the photolithographic part of the chip-making process. Even with this impressive job at Intel, he continued his education, maintaining a brutal schedule for several months, commuting between his job in Portland and school and his family in Seattle. Finally he had to choose between moving his family to Portland or giving up Intel.
Education comes first
Opting again for the better educational choice, he continued at North, while his wife worked and the family received additional support from the VA. His next job came from a contact made through his instructor at North. Otis Elevator offered him a full-time job and, when his job put him in violation of VA scholarship rules, offered to pick up the tab on his next round of education. NSCC employment counselors got him advanced placement credit for his experience at Intel and internship credit for his work with Otis Elevator.
Been There, Done That
With all of his moving and jobs and various funding sources, Gabriel's credits were all over the map. Still looking for that four-year degree, he pulled them together through a four-year distance education degree from University of the State of New York, utilizing his work in the Electronics Division at North as the centerpiece of a highly individualistic approach to accrual of academic credit. North was there with more of what he needed than any other two-year school he approached.
Advice
Sometimes it's difficult to balance family and employment obligations with educational demands, but the effort is well worth the trouble. The help I received from the faculty and staff at North Seattle Community College was invaluable in enabling me to achieve my goals. I always wanted to do more than I was given to do, and thanks to NSCC, now I can really do it!
Gabriel Lissade
© 2003—2008