A new curriculum that focuses on aviation maintenance training is on the horizon at the University of Maryland Eastern Shore through the help of grant funding from Wicomico County and the State of Maryland.
The Federal Aviation Administration-certified course would include participants logging 1,900 hours of training through the university. The credits can be applied to additional training in the aviation sciences major at UMES.
“There’s a tremendous shortage of aviation maintenance technicians in this country … coming out of the pandemic and (with) the increase in aviation customers in terms of commercial flight,” Dr. Derrek Dunn, professor and dean of the School of Business and Technology at UMES, said. “So, it was a natural fit for them to approach us because of our current footprint with aviation sciences with our professional pilot program and our aviation management program.”
Wicomico County’s funding will come through a $3.2 million grant from the Rural Maryland Economic Development Fund. The investment program, which was created earlier this year, allows rural regional councils throughout the state to apply for capital to “boost economic development activity, stimulate private sector investment, and grow jobs in the state’s rural regions,” according to a press release from the office of Maryland Governor Larry Hogan.
Eligible uses for the funds include developing infrastructure like utilities and transportation, as well as for workforce development and the attraction of talent and projects that stimulate entrepreneurship and innovation, according to the release.
Dunn said discussions regarding the creation of the program have been in progress for close to two years and added the cost of developing a program of this nature is a tremendous undertaking.
“The program is very expensive, obviously, in terms of needs of equipment and other items that students can work on in terms of being trained to maintain and repair commercial aircraft,” he said. “So, it took quite a while to work together, find the money, (to) determine the curriculum … to make this program happen. We’re still probably two-thirds of the way through in terms of (it) actually becoming reality.”
Dunn said the new curriculum would consist of three aspects – general aviation maintenance, airframe — which is the structure of the plane itself — and the Power Plant.
The partnership is the most recent of between the School of Business and Technology, which includes previous public-private collaborations with Microsoft, Apple, Boeing, and on a regional scale with Delmarva Power and the Potomac Electric Power Company (Pepco).
“This is the way the school of business and technology is now working to set up new initiatives,” he said. “No longer working by itself but working with industry partners and government partners to help us set those up and also help with funding.
“This is sort of a new paradigm. A new model of how to work with individuals to start new academic initiatives.”
