Speaker 1: Do you want to be an American idiot?
Speaker 2: It's plenty back seven hundred WLW. So if you knew
Speaker 2: this about our great state here in Ohio, we are
Speaker 2: not just the birthplace of aviation. I believe that because
Speaker 2: it says that right on your license plate. You know
Speaker 2: it's also one of the top spots for aerospace, aviation
Speaker 2: and defense. We are the number one supplier, the number
Speaker 2: one supply ohioways to both Airbus and Boeing, with more
Speaker 2: than one hundred and ten thousand employees in the industry,
Speaker 2: six hundred companies in Ohio, and we right now you think, wow,
Speaker 2: we're pretty saturated. We can't train enough people to fill
Speaker 2: those jobs. And the future is looking really really bright
Speaker 2: for a lot of these trades within aerospace. And so
Speaker 2: I'm sure you've heard about this. At Middletown Regional Airport,
Speaker 2: Butler Tech just open a brand new, state of the art,
Speaker 2: fifteen million dollar aviation center and this is for high
Speaker 2: school students and it's underway right now. The ribbon has
Speaker 2: been cut and in studios William Sprinkles, he's the superintendent
Speaker 2: in CEO of Butler Tech. Welcome to the studio, William.
Speaker 2: Congratulations by the way, on the on the ribbon cutting,
Speaker 2: thank you for that, Sarah, thank you for having us,
Speaker 2: of course, And I think the biggest question to have
Speaker 2: for you, sir, is do you get to keep the
Speaker 2: giant scissors? What happens to the giant scissors you cut
Speaker 2: the ribbon on?
Speaker 3: You know, the giant scissors didn't work at the ribbon cutting,
Speaker 3: are you kidding?
Speaker 1: We had to have a pair of micro scissors.
Speaker 3: You had a backup scissors shadowed underneath the giant scissors.
Speaker 3: The giant scissors the blade was too dull and didn't work.
Speaker 1: And so I'm sorry.
Speaker 3: We had some nail clippers and some micro scissors. That's
Speaker 3: not acceptable. It works, it works perfect. You're the CEO
Speaker 3: heads need to roll for this? Would you agree?
Speaker 1: Not at all? But in the world of career tech,
Speaker 1: we made it work.
Speaker 2: Okay, you made it happen. You think on the fly
Speaker 2: we always let's coect. I love it. People think, hey,
Speaker 2: aviation industry, everyone wants to be a pilot. That's not true,
Speaker 2: because you have maintenance, you have avionics, you have manufacturing,
Speaker 2: you have all these things. And and also we now
Speaker 2: have flying taxis that are being built in date and
Speaker 2: I believe if I'm not mistaken. So that's a whole
Speaker 2: other sector, a whole nother evolution and layer of aerospace.
Speaker 2: We think aerospace, oh, ge, But there's so many more
Speaker 2: companies there. I'm sure ge is it has a hand
Speaker 2: in what the programming is that you do at Butler
Speaker 2: Tech William But other companies involved are what like, how
Speaker 2: many other companies I have to say and like, hey,
Speaker 2: here's here's we want to be job ready, this is
Speaker 2: a workforce development thing. How many companies have a seat
Speaker 2: at the table?
Speaker 1: Sure?
Speaker 3: At our ribbon cutting we acknowledged at least twelve companies
Speaker 3: that are from the region. Companies like CTL Aerospace Standard ERA,
Speaker 3: which are more in the manufacturing and the aero defense side.
Speaker 3: There's other smaller companies that are local A ANDP mechanics shop,
Speaker 3: companies that sit on the that sit on the Middletown runway,
Speaker 3: and so companies whether they're small in size or large
Speaker 3: in corporate status. We try our best to welcome all
Speaker 3: of them and have a seat at the table and
Speaker 3: provide influence in the shape and the design of the
Speaker 3: curriculum and the experience that the students get.
Speaker 2: Now, I often talk about this on my show, here
Speaker 2: you beat a trades guy myself and you were identifying
Speaker 2: with the hell you're a doctor now, so doctor sprinkles.
Speaker 2: They were both like tactile learners, right. You know in school,
Speaker 2: I was like, I'm looking at a book. I like,
Speaker 2: I don't get THEE for it. But you put something
Speaker 2: applied in front of someone, all of a sudden, the
Speaker 2: light bulb goes off. We have done for the last
Speaker 2: couple of generations, at least the poor job of that.
Speaker 2: How much are we writing the ship now? It's starting
Speaker 2: to it's starting to come back to center a little bit.
Speaker 3: I think many people would argue for career tech centers,
Speaker 3: we've already righted that ship. And it's important to name
Speaker 3: that because this idea that career tech centers were only
Speaker 3: for one type of student or a particular type of
Speaker 3: learner is outdated. In Butler Tech's case, we serve eighteen
Speaker 3: thousand students a day between the grades seven and twelve,
Speaker 3: and we serve an additional twenty two to twenty three
Speaker 3: thousand learners a year in our adult education division. So
Speaker 3: in the grand scheme of one calendar year, we're going
Speaker 3: to serve over forty thousand people are going to access
Speaker 3: cred tech education from a Butler Tech location. That's cool
Speaker 3: class or even a weekend credentialing program.
Speaker 2: Yeah, because I was a kid in you know, we
Speaker 2: have barely had shop class, and I was so into that.
Speaker 2: I loved it, and they took it away and basically said, well,
Speaker 2: if you want to do that, you've got to go
Speaker 2: this whole Shepherd school for the kids who are troublemakers,
Speaker 2: because the students go here and the dummies go there.
Speaker 2: And thank god, we finally blew that up right.
Speaker 1: Yes, so you're correct.
Speaker 3: In particular, in the late eighties and the early nineties,
Speaker 3: there's a lot of research about a particular type of family,
Speaker 3: a particular type of student. Those students were forced, persuaded,
Speaker 3: or channeled to career tech centers. And I'm proud to
Speaker 3: say now and really the last ten years at Butler Tech,
Speaker 3: but even today in twenty twenty six, we represent every
Speaker 3: single possibility for a student and a family. If you
Speaker 3: want to go right to the workforce, we have a
Speaker 3: program for that. If you want to go to a
Speaker 3: two year school, we have a program that'll kickstart you
Speaker 3: and get you ahead and lower the cost of that
Speaker 3: two year journey and if you want to eventually go
Speaker 3: to a four year school or even your doctorate program.
Speaker 3: We have pathways that lead to those experiences, things such
Speaker 3: as biomedical engineering and our bioscience center. We have something
Speaker 3: for everybody that leads to a high level education, a
Speaker 3: hands on education and hopefully it keeps families and students
Speaker 3: out of debt and poverty free.
Speaker 1: And these are skills.
Speaker 2: They are in demand because now you're partnering with the
Speaker 2: companies that so it's a great pipeline.
Speaker 1: They're trained up.
Speaker 2: And you hear that for college, the college path traditional
Speaker 2: for year university that young people will graduate, they'll come
Speaker 2: and they have no job skills whatsoever. Like they have
Speaker 2: this degree but no job skills. You guys are teaching
Speaker 2: not only the craft but also how to develop that
Speaker 2: you know, how to get in that situation, I guess
Speaker 2: is what I'm trying to say, and be actually just
Speaker 2: work from day one.
Speaker 1: They don't have to retrain you like they do with
Speaker 1: a college degree. Yeah, so I appreciate that framing.
Speaker 3: Our belief is that young people need to have the
Speaker 3: actual hands on skills and the actual processes of how
Speaker 3: to operate machines and equipment and the credentials to make
Speaker 3: them successful in the workforce. We also believe our young
Speaker 3: people at Butler Tech have an opportunity to have the
Speaker 3: business acumen to not only be the person that works
Speaker 3: on the shop lore, but if they eventually aspire to
Speaker 3: want to be the CEO of the factory, they have
Speaker 3: that opportunity, and we give them those skill sets to
Speaker 3: start moving in that direction and can start their career.
Speaker 2: The young people I mentor in the trades and trying
Speaker 2: to get them situated in which which type of trade
Speaker 2: with electrician, plumber, h F whatever it is, aviation. It's like, listen,
Speaker 2: you know you're smart enough to do this, okay, and
Speaker 2: go to school, but also keep an eye out how
Speaker 2: the business runs, because the goal some day is to
Speaker 2: get you to own your own company. And that's true
Speaker 2: not for everybody, but for a lot of these kids
Speaker 2: are like, wow, I can do this, and I learned
Speaker 2: so much that I want to go and do it
Speaker 2: my way now and hire people and become the next
Speaker 2: generation of entrepreneurs.
Speaker 3: Yeah, there's a lot of social media footage right now
Speaker 3: about one particular type of entrepreneur that's going to emerge
Speaker 3: because of the conflict with artificial intelligence is electricians. Electricians
Speaker 3: are going to triple their worth and triple their value.
Speaker 3: The cost that you're going to be able to charge
Speaker 3: and to make and to create profit share by being
Speaker 3: in a high skilled electrician is not something that artificial
Speaker 3: intelligence is going to take over that trade of soon.
Speaker 2: Anyways, my nephew moved here from out West and he's like,
Speaker 2: I just want to work. I want to get a job,
Speaker 2: and I want to go to school. He said, what
Speaker 2: should I do? And I will consider trades. I've mentioned
Speaker 2: aviation he goes. He goes, well, which one has the
Speaker 2: most gross and said, hands down, electrician because of data farms,
Speaker 2: because of the infrastructures, Like you're gonna have a job
Speaker 2: for the rest of your life and beyond. You may
Speaker 2: be working from the grave if you want to, but
Speaker 2: you're gonna make great money and you're gonna meet and
Speaker 2: demand do that because we need electrical workers more than anything.
Speaker 1: WILLIAMS.
Speaker 2: Sprinkles is the superintendent CEO Butler Tech. They just opened
Speaker 2: a fifteen million at state of the art aviation centered
Speaker 2: Middletown Airport and its workforce development. We're talking about Ohio
Speaker 2: is the number one supplier to Airbus and Boeing, and
Speaker 2: there's one hundred and ten thousand jobs and it's growing
Speaker 2: here in Ohai. If you're looking to get in a
Speaker 2: profession's can be around for a long time. We have
Speaker 2: despite what you see with TSA lines and everything else
Speaker 2: in that nightmare, and maybe that goes to show you
Speaker 2: need more workers. But air travel and cargo with on
Speaker 2: demand is getting bigger and bigger and bigger. If you
Speaker 2: thought it was already big, it's going to get much bigger.
Speaker 2: The projection is maybe even triple in just a number
Speaker 2: of years where we are right now. That's kind of
Speaker 2: hard to believe. But you need the bodies in there too.
Speaker 2: And you hear about AI and automation coming for jobs
Speaker 2: that doesn't apply here, does it?
Speaker 3: Well?
Speaker 1: It it does many of the trade pathways. Here's the thinking.
Speaker 3: If you think that you are going to be replaced
Speaker 3: by a robot, you probably are. You have to be
Speaker 3: willing to work with the emerging technology and work with robots.
Speaker 3: So there's a lot of technical pathways that are working
Speaker 3: with cobots. There's a lot of technical pathways that have
Speaker 3: to learn how to navigate the prompt engineering to embed
Speaker 3: AI inside of the pathways. It's not something that AI
Speaker 3: is exclusive from being invasive of those pathways. We're pushing
Speaker 3: all of our students, all of our teachers, all of
Speaker 3: our staff to embrace artificial intelligence and make sure that
Speaker 3: they're on the cutting edge of what's happening in those
Speaker 3: particular trades, industries and local local pipelines. Yeah, because you
Speaker 3: it's not something you can fight at this point. If
Speaker 3: you're not embracing it and working alongside it, it's going
Speaker 3: to be a competitor for you eventually.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and you know, you're right, there's going to be
Speaker 2: a displacement. But I'm wondering, you know, if you're an AVIA,
Speaker 2: if you're a mechanic, for example, AI is not gonna
Speaker 2: it may it may augment your job, it may change
Speaker 2: some things as being a force multiplier for you, but
Speaker 2: you still have to get in and fix that engine
Speaker 2: or that part. AI is not in a robots to
Speaker 2: be able to do that because you have to have
Speaker 2: the critical thinking which may be augmented by AI, but
Speaker 2: you still have to do it with your hands as
Speaker 2: opposed to a robot. So I think those jud But
Speaker 2: I wonder about pilots. You know, we know, there's a
Speaker 2: massive pilot shortage right now. When you can't get enough pilots,
Speaker 2: do we start to see as is autonomous airplanes a
Speaker 2: thing's going to happen.
Speaker 3: There's a lot of companies that are investing billions of
Speaker 3: dollars into the regional economy here in the Greater Cincinnati
Speaker 3: great and Dating great in ed Area, great in Dayton areas,
Speaker 3: Greater Dayton areas such as such as Jobi. Yeah, that
Speaker 3: specialize in the vertical lift and take off. Is that
Speaker 3: the air taxis I was talking about. It is the
Speaker 3: air taxis and so those are still being piloted. They're
Speaker 3: what we're seeing right now in industry is they're making
Speaker 3: a shift from delivering goods and content and packages that
Speaker 3: are in particular weights to figuring out the volume of
Speaker 3: how many people that they can transport. And then you
Speaker 3: have to figure out how the airspace is regulated for
Speaker 3: the particular size of those particular aircrafts and how they
Speaker 3: work in airspace.
Speaker 1: And that's a whole nother a.
Speaker 2: I see AI managing air traffic too, air traffic controllers,
Speaker 2: it's gonna be AI. It's gonna be a while before
Speaker 2: one of us goes Yeah, I'm gonna get on this
Speaker 2: plane with no pilot. It's that's gonna take a minute,
Speaker 2: that's gonna take him in.
Speaker 3: Well, there's already the autonomous cars that are predominantly in
Speaker 3: the larger metropolitan areas. They're they're out west in Phoenix.
Speaker 3: When I was in Phoenix for a conference, they're out
Speaker 3: west and it's crazy, right, and you they're fully autonomous.
Speaker 1: Yep, no driver in them. It's not that far off. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's not.
Speaker 2: It's just again, the early adopters will be like, I
Speaker 2: may try this if I'm adventurous, but I can see
Speaker 2: how people get nervous about that. But in the future,
Speaker 2: in you know, twenty thirty, forty fifty years, it'll just
Speaker 2: be ah, this is what we do. We have Bilois,
Speaker 2: we don't need it. It'll look like the Jetsons correct,
Speaker 2: and we're headed that way. What is your completion rate
Speaker 2: and also placement rate for new grads? Now, granted you
Speaker 2: just opened the center right now, but I'm sure you
Speaker 2: have a target. But what's your success been. We have
Speaker 2: two answers for that.
Speaker 3: Our graduation rate at bull at Tech for the last
Speaker 3: ten years is ninety nine percent. Nine percent some years
Speaker 3: it's one hundred. The lowest it's been is ninety nine.
Speaker 3: The students that complete our secondary pathway, which is the
Speaker 3: equivalent of a high school diploma, those students we're graduating
Speaker 3: ninety nine percent of our students.
Speaker 1: And shout outs to not only our staff, but all.
Speaker 3: Of the partner schools that have partner based relationships that
Speaker 3: feed into Butler Tech. That's important to acknowledge our relationship
Speaker 3: with them. And on the adult education side, our placement
Speaker 3: rate is ninety percent for adult learners of every single
Speaker 3: ethnic group that we have, so that means white students,
Speaker 3: Black students, Asian students, Hispanic last Hispanic Latino students, multi
Speaker 3: racial students. Ninety percent of students from any subgroup. That's incredible,
Speaker 3: get placed into a job of the of the pathway,
Speaker 3: of the credential that they acquired within six months.
Speaker 2: That goes to show you just how successful and why
Speaker 2: this fifteen million dollar plan is needed. So on that,
Speaker 2: I know, the median wage for someone in the aerospace
Speaker 2: industries like right around six figures, right, one hundred thousand
Speaker 2: dollars people leaving with that degree leaving Butler Tech, what
Speaker 2: are they earning?
Speaker 3: Students are not leaving Butler Tech with a degree after
Speaker 3: their high school experience. What they are leaving with is
Speaker 3: a series of high level credentials that are accepted and
Speaker 3: embraced within the industry in multiple different subpathways. So at
Speaker 3: our Aerospace Center, students will filter through one of three pathways.
Speaker 3: There is the aerospace pathway, which many students will lead
Speaker 3: right into college.
Speaker 1: That's a four year pathway.
Speaker 3: Students matriculate to four year universities if they want to
Speaker 3: focus on aerospace, or many of those students will head
Speaker 3: into manufacturing careers that work for Department of Defense and
Speaker 3: other types of industries like that. There are students that
Speaker 3: will be the mechanics, which is the AMP the airframe
Speaker 3: and power plant mechanic pathway. That particular industry has thousands
Speaker 3: of jobs within a two hour radius of the greater
Speaker 3: Cincinnati area. And then the third pathway, students will have
Speaker 3: the opportunity to earn various different credentials for their private
Speaker 3: pilot license. Their private pilot license can be for their
Speaker 3: personal aircraft, can lead to the ability to fly a
Speaker 3: corporate aircraft, and it can also lead to your drone license,
Speaker 3: which is huge in various different sub industries. Right now,
Speaker 3: such as defense, real estate, construction, and that list goes
Speaker 3: on and on and on, and of course industries like
Speaker 3: yourself in the media industry.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, that's fascinating.
Speaker 2: So you're pretty much guaranteed a job, you know, and
Speaker 2: not only that, the success rate is so high it's
Speaker 2: a no brainer. Not I think it may be for
Speaker 2: somebody who's going, wow, am I going to get laid off?
Speaker 2: I've got laid off again? I maybe you want to
Speaker 2: pivot career. Why see adult education program is wonderful. It
Speaker 2: is the brand new Butler Tech Aviation Center at Middletown
Speaker 2: Regional Airport. William Sprinkle, Superintendent and CEO Butler Tech, thanks
Speaker 2: for popping in today.
Speaker 1: Appreciate it. Thank you for having me.
Speaker 3: And what would be important to also acknowledge is we
Speaker 3: have a ribbon cutting for our brand new bioscience center
Speaker 3: in one month on April thirteenth, which is strictly about
Speaker 3: the forecast of jobs in this market for healthcare, which
Speaker 3: is one of the most booming in demand fields.
Speaker 1: This state. Has gonna bring the good scissors this time
Speaker 1: for that one. We're going to bring the good scissors.
Speaker 1: Don't you can do it once and screw it up. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I can't have it twice though, You're gonna have to.
Speaker 1: We're going to bring the great ribbons, practice ribbon, practice scissors.
Speaker 1: Let's do put a little work in sprinkle. We got it, well,
Speaker 1: got it. Appreciate you. Thanks for coming to all right,
Speaker 1: thanks again.
Speaker 2: Got to get the news update in here momentarily slowly.
Speaker 1: Seven hundred win snat