Miramar College internships with Delta paying off
The budding relationship between San Diego Miramar College and Delta Air Lines has landed four maintenance students internships with the air carrier, and the initiative is picking up steam. The airframe and powerplant program placed its first paid intern at the airline in December 2015 and is now on pace for two internships per year, said Lonny Bosselman, the school’s aviation maintenance technology director.
The college’s newest intern is Rod Tiong, who recently completed his maintenance coursework and is already turning wrenches for Delta TechOps at its San Diego International Airport line maintenance service center while he prepares for his FAA exams.
The paid internships call for students to work about 20 hours per weekend so they can still handle their daily classwork. “It’s a pretty long slug,” Bosselman previously told AOPA.
Some of Delta’s corporate personnel recently paid a visit to Miramar “to develop a more formal relationship,” Bosselman said, adding that he hoped Delta’s audit of the college’s facilities could “turn into a pipeline for hiring maintainers for their airline.”
The success of Miramar College's Delta relationship has led to interest from other air carriers including Honolulu-based Hawaiian Airlines, which recently picked up Miramar College graduate Jenny Bishop for a maintenance position. Bosselman pointed out that Hawaiian’s routes and aircraft inventory are growing and leading to new opportunities for his graduates.
Bosselman said that the airline maintenance industry in general is "looking for the best mechanic candidates they can find” to combat attrition and support expansion in the years to come.
