News about Alumni

Philly Shipyard Inc. recently donated welding consumables to Pennsylvania College of Technology for instructional use in the college’s welding program.

The donation includes nine pallets of Lincoln Electric brand welding consumables; Lincoln Electric paid for the freight costs associated with the donation.

Philly Shipyard, a leading U.S. shipbuilder presently pursuing a mix of commercial and government work, expects to hire nearly 200 welders in 2021 to accommodate work on a new project involving four government training vessels for use at the state maritime academies. The donated material had to be replaced with material specific to the company’s new contracts.

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For Thomas L. Snyder, his graduation at Pennsylvania College of Technology on May 16 will mark more than the end of a rigorous academic pursuit. It will close his family’s chapter at the college, which dates to the Kennedy Administration.

The Weedville native’s lineage is linked to the college’s evolution from a renowned postsecondary technical institute to the second community college in Pennsylvania to its current status as a national leader in applied technology education.

Snyder’s maternal grandfather, Thomas E. Foster, earned a machinist certificate from Williamsport Technical Institute in 1962, and his father, Troy L. Snyder, attended Williamsport Area Community College in the mid-1980s, just a few years before it became Penn College, a special mission affiliate of Penn State.

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From the Spring 2021 Penn College Magazine: Extraordinary curiosity led Fletcher Ewing, ’98, from childhood Soap Box Derbies to an innovation-filled career. His latest role is senior mechanical engineer for X, developing robots with the humanlike capacity to learn. Read “Revolutionizing Robotics.”

Nursing alumna Stephanie Suzadail, whose airborne delivery of emergency care is featured in the spring issue of Penn College Magazine, recently established two aptly named funds in support of Pennsylvania College of Technology students.

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Interested in the production of such items as water bottles and eyeglass lenses, but intimidated by the somewhat cryptic vocabulary of the industry? Instructor Joshua J. Rice, a Spring 2013 graduate of Penn College and co-department head for plastics and polymer technology, demystifies the field with a plain-spoken virtual tour of the college’s industry-cherished labs. Join him for a four-minute glimpse at the five processes taught in the School of Engineering Technologies – blow molding, extrusion, injection molding, rotational molding and thermoforming – and the everyday products that result.

From the Spring 2021 Penn College Magazine: Having weathered many challenges herself, Geisinger Life Flight’s Stephanie Suzadail, ’14, loves to provide calm in the center of the storm. Read “A flight nurse’s calling.”

Seven students enrolled in Penn College’s brewing and fermentation science certificate presented their beers to a panel of industry professionals at an evening gathering this week.

Visiting campus to lend their expertise were: John Callahan, brewing manager, D.G. Yuengling & Son Inc.; Tom Clark, owner/brewmaster, Berwick Brewing Co.; Mark Fabrizio, vice president of brewing operations Victory Brewing Co.; Sean Hamilton, brewer at New York Beer Project and a 2019 graduate of Penn College’s brewing and fermentation science program; and Philip Jensen, head distiller, Big Springs Distilling Co. Also serving on the panel was David S. Richards, professor of physics.

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An alumnus’s investment in the next generation of innovators, the literal future of American manufacturing, was spotlighted during the April 27 dedication of the Larry A. Ward Machining Technologies Center at Pennsylvania College of Technology.

Last year’s $1 million-plus donation from Ward, a 1966 graduate in engineering drafting technology, monumentally reshaped the expansive laboratory – one of the oldest on campus, dating to the benefactor’s days as a student at Williamsport Technical Institute and Williamsport Area Community College, the institution’s predecessors.

“A strong advocate for the future of manufacturing in America, Larry is committed to enhancing our automated manufacturing and machining curriculum, lab space and opportunities to prepare students for successful and sustaining careers,” college President Davie Jane Gilmour said. “It is this commitment that has transformed our machining lab, but Larry’s generosity does not stop there. He has donated materials and equipment, sponsored a commencement award for mechatronics students, and hired Penn College graduates and interns as his business grew.”

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Whether working below ground level or well into the treetops, Michael A. Dincher’s students get to experience the wide scope of arboriculture.

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Future health care professionals have access to a learning tool that simulates respiratory symptoms likely to be encountered in the field, thanks to a $2,500 sustaining grant from PPL Foundation to Pennsylvania College of Technology.

The 2020 contribution enabled purchase of a lung sounds simulator, which mimics real-life scenarios essential to educating health care providers.

“PPL is pleased to partner with Penn College to help enhance training for current and aspiring health care professionals,” said Tracie L. Witter, regional affairs director.  “We appreciate the efforts of Penn College Workforce Development to help improve the skills of our community’s front-line workers.”

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Pennsylvania College of Technology’s 2020 class of occupational therapy assistant graduates achieved a 100% pass rate on the Certified Occupational Therapy Assistant exam.

The exam is administered by the National Board for Certification in Occupational Therapy. Fifty states, Guam, Puerto Rico and Washington, D.C., require NBCOT certification in order to be licensed to practice as an occupational therapy assistant.

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Those who assume responsibility for cleaning up the commonwealth’s roads under the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation’s Adopt-a-Highway program – and more than 3,500 volunteers have signed on for stewardship of nearly 8,000 miles to date – generally have their commendable hands full tending to litter pickup alone. Penn College General Services, which keeps the entire institution humming and beautiful year-round, obviously didn’t stop there in its first official roadside foray. (The college contracted last year to adopt the Interstate 180 on/off ramps south of campus, but the state suspended the program in Spring 2020 when many counties were under stay-at-home orders.) The “all hands on deck” work detail was initiated by Timothy M. Weigle, associate director of maintenance, and a large group of tool-wielding co-workers, equipped by PennDOT with safety vests and trash bags, made quick work of enhancing the neighborhood.

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A Pennsylvania College of Technology student organization’s video about a viable do-it-yourself alternative to traditional concrete – with humor among its key ingredients – was a Top 20 finisher in a recent competition sponsored by an industry trade group.

Three members of the college’s ConCreate Design Club, a student chapter of the American Concrete Institute, produced and co-starred in the seven-minute video, which was entered in ACI’s Concrete Solutions Competition. Participating were Madison L. Kistler, of Kutztown, club president; vice president Harrison H. Wohlfarth, of Midlothian, Virginia; and Noah W. Shafer, of Towanda, a member of the club’s board of directors.

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Four members of the ConCreate Design Club joined instructor Harry W. Hintz Jr. at the Lycoming County Veterans Memorial Park this week, installing paving bricks engraved with the names of Penn College students and faculty who have worked on the project over the past three years. The group rendezvoused at the West Fourth Street/Wahoo Drive site with John O. Markley, of the Veterans Memorial Park Commission, who oversaw the latest enhancement to the ever-expanding memorial. As preparations continue for a Memorial Day dedication at the park, organizers generously wanted to permanently spell out the college’s collaboration. The pavers acknowledge Hintz and three other faculty members – Glenn R. Luse, Richard R. Motter Jr. and Franklin H. Reber Jr. – as well as more than 100 students engaged in the improvements to date, from site preparation to stone-wall construction.

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When local sports legend Bill Byham passed away in late May 2017, his unpublished novel – offering relevant life lessons through the prism of junior-high football – could easily have died with him.

The manuscript of “Bucky Deacon’s Dilemma,” pecked out on a typewriter during summers by the pool, had languished for decades since Byham tried unsuccessfully to get it published through the comparably limited outlets of the 1980s and ’90s. The dream of sharing Bucky’s story with the world would have remained unrealized, but for a friend who fondly remembered his once-upon-a-time reading of it.

“A couple weeks before he died, Bill just wanted to write. He talked about it a lot,” said Tom Speicher, who met Byham as a Lycoming College freshman. “About two years afterward, I got the idea that publishing his book would be a great way to pay tribute to him. We need more stories like this, sharing the virtues of teamwork, conflict resolution and friendship.”

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