SNYDER, Texas — On Wednesday, Western Texas College in Snyder graduated its 100th student from the school’s commercial driver license program.
The student, Kolby Rister already had a job by the time he graduated. He said he will be working as a line-haul driver, taking freight to Dallas and back every day.
“The money’s good and the job opportunities are really endless. You don’t technically have to go over the road. There are so many opportunities that present themselves with the CDL. Anyone looking to get there CDL, I highly recommend it, because there’s jobs out there,” Rister said.
It was not difficult for Rister to find a position as a truck driver because there is a huge demand for skilled drivers right now.
"The demand is incredibly high, especially in the era of COVID and everything we've been through the past year people are shopping more online and they’re purchasing more online. They're having things shipped to them, so the demand is just enormous these days," Western Texas College Director of Workforce Development and Continuing Education Margo Mitchell said.
According to data from the U.S. Census Bureau, more than 3.5 million people work as truck drivers in the United States. It is one of the most common occupations in the country.
Western Texas College started the CDL program in 2017 using one of Scurry County’s gravel trucks to train with until they could by their own. The impetus to beginning training drivers was a rule announced by U.S. Department of Transportation Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration on entry-level driver training in December of 2016, implemented in 2017. The rule was originally to be effective by February 2020, but was put off until 2022.
According to the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, the rule states that anyone wishing to obtain a CDL would first have to attend a truck driving training program on the FMCSA’S Training Provider Registry. The rule also streamlines driving training curriculum.
“It may surprise people that we haven’t had this. This has not been in place. There were no standardizations about what was being taught. Anybody could pop up a truck driving school. There was no oversight and there was also no oversight of drivers. I mean if you’re uncle had a flatbed out there with a rig, you could try to go pass the test on your own,” Mitchell said.
The rule was first put into motion as provision of an act signed in law by President Barack Obama called the Moving Ahead for Progress in the 21st Century Act of MAP-21.
“So, in February 2022, everyone will have to go through a mandatory truck driving school. We originally started it anticipating it was going to be a great need. That we would build a program that would be able to provide that type of training out here in West Texas, so that’s what we did,” Mitchell said.
Mitchell says the rule will make the roads safer by giving professional driver’s formal training.
“We really needed to streamline our truck drivers on the roads in the United States, That was just very clear. It was a safety issue and for the large trucking companies, it was also a maintenance issue. People need to know how to properly driver these trucks. I mean double clutching…There’s just some much that goes into driving these trucks to reduce wear and tear,” Mitchell said. “Some people think because they’ve driven a stick shift or something like that out of the farm that they can just come in and get behind one of these trucks and that’s not the case at all.”
The CDL program at Western Texas College consists of 40 hours of classroom learning, before a student goes to the Texas Department of Motor Vehicles to take a written exam and then starts skills training behind the wheel. Mitchell said the program only takes four to six weeks to complete.
Mitchell also said many businesses around the area have sent employees through the training program with the tuition paid by grants from the Texas Workforce Commission.
“I have a number of grants through the Texas Workforce Commission. We have a skills training grant. We have a small business grant. Both will actually pay the tuition for the truck driving school for businesses that have employees that they want to send through our training program, and we’ve done that quite successfully with a number of businesses,” Mitchell said.
There is also individual tuition support through Texas Workforce Solutions for those who are unemployed or indigent.