Texas College Builds a Thriving Welding Degree Program
In just four years, Blinn College grew its welding program from 23 students the first semester to nearly 140 students.
And the growth isn’t stopping for the two-year welding program. To meet demand, Blinn is partnering with the Texas A&M University system on a new shared campus that will double Blinn’s welding booths. With big dreams for the future, program leaders say their approach is built on experienced teachers, a relevant curriculum and reliable welding equipment. Learn more about how Blinn is giving students the tools to succeed — and how equipment and filler metals from Miller, Hobart and Bernard play a role in the school’s thriving program.
To learn more about the Miller® Dynasty® 300 DX multiprocess welder, visit
https://www.millerwelds.com/equipment/welders/multiprocess/dynasty-300-multiprocess-welder-m90595
To learn more about the XMT® 450 multiprocess welder from Miller, visit:
https://www.millerwelds.com/equipment/welders/multiprocess/xmt-450-multiprocess-welder-m00430
To learn more about Bernard® BTB Semi-Automatic Air-Cooled MIG Welding Guns, visit:
https://www.tregaskiss.com/product/btb/
Video Transcript
My name is Dickie Jones, and I’m a program manager for Blinn Welding throughout our Blinn district. We cover four campuses, including the one here in Brenham. The degree program actually started in January of 2016. Our first class had 23 people, and this semester we have enrolled 138 students in our program. We think it’s going to go bigger.
There are a lot of factors that make our students successful. You have to have instructors who are willing to get in the booths and demonstrate. You have to have a curriculum that’s accurate and relevant to the field, and you have to have machines that are honest behind you. Every weld is your handwriting; every weld is different, and you have to set yourself apart from everybody else to get jobs. You have to have pride in it. I have been astounded by the way our welding program has grown. All our classes are full, and we can attribute that to the quality of welder that we’re turning out.
I decided I wanted to get the degree because it’s something I really want to make a career out of and continue to do throughout my life. We try to give them not only the tools and education you need to survive out there, but also the paper and certificates to back it up. Here at Blinn, we have an entry-level pipe class. In advanced pipe, we add wire welding into the equation so that they understand how to weld pipe with hard wire and with flux-cored wire. As far as the welding program goes here, you have the two best teachers, so there’s nothing you don’t learn here. It would be doing the students a disservice to have them using a machine that is different than they’re going to use in industry. So I want my machines heavy duty. I want them extremely relevant. I want them to be consistent. I want every machine to be able to put all of them on the exact same setting and get the same results.
The Bernard MIG guns are pretty lightweight. They’re very easy to use and are comfortable to hold in your hand, and they’re very practical. In our labs, we have connected all our Miller 22A wire feeders. We have Bernard guns. The Centerfire is so user-friendly that I actually bought conversion kits and changed all our non-Bernard gear over to Bernard consumables. These things can take crazy amounts of abuse. I’ve got to know that everything is reliable. If there’s a question, I know that I can contact Miller and get that answer. Here at the Brenham campus, we have a rack of the 450s, and they are working extremely well. We’re getting a rack of six with the 350s. So we’re going to get four of those to cover 24 of our booths. That’ll give us that multi-purpose machine. The other machine is the Miller 280 DXs, and they’re working really, really well with the XMTs. With the 280 DXs, we feel like we’ve gotten the best of all of them. I definitely think using Miller is very easy to use, especially if you’re a newbie. It’s all right there, and it tells you step-by-step how to do it. The umbrella with Miller, Hobart, is leading some of the best together to make it all work. We’ve had good experiences with it and are very pleased. I see our future as very bright. We want to be number one in the state of Texas for welding. We can grow as big as we want it to grow, so that means that we’ve got to keep our equipment and everything with the latest in technology. We’ve got to know that we’re meeting an industry standard.