Our heavy equipment training schools strive to deliver training that is both industry relevant and at the same time compliant with national standards. To achieve this we designed our training programs inline with those established by the various national bodies. This enables us to seek accreditation for the delivery of this training. As a student at ATS Heavy Equipment Operator Schools, you know the training is industry approved and relevant to the work place. But how do you know?

The internet has brought a valuable resource to online shoppers in the form of product reviews. Recent research is showing that many online shoppers are first referring to product reviews before making a purchasing decision. I assume you are reading this post because you have some interest in the field of heavy equipment as a possible career choice. Our training is a product and many of our graduates have, over time, contacted us to leave very positive feedback about their time with us. Take Jim from Minnesota as an example. He writes in part:

…..My employment started one month after graduation and would have never been considered without the certification I received from ATS. The knowledge I received from their down-to-earth instructors has proven to be invaluable. Attending ATS has been the single most important event of my life….

In fact, we have interviewed many of our former students to gain some form of feedback related to our training programs. You can view these videos on our student feedback pages. Do we get negative feedback? After more than 25 years providing training to heavy equipment operators and truck drivers, of course we do – but it’s very rare and when we do we look closely at the issue to see what changes need to be made.

If you are considering a career as a heavy equipment operator, check on what sort of feedback is being left by former students – if any. Heavy equipment training schools are there to provide training for those seeking employment as heavy equipment operators – be sure your training organization is providing training that employers are looking for. Otherwise, you could be wasting your time and money. See what our former students have to say before making any firm decisions.

If you’re considering becoming a bulldozer operator then the first thing you will need to consider is bulldozer operator training. If you pick up a telephone book, newspaper or search on line you will find hundreds of places that offer this training. Your task is to find a training provider that is close to home; provides accredited training; is well respected within the industry; and can offer a job placement service should you need it. Depending on your circumstances you may also need to consider how you are going to fund your training.

We have thought of all of these factors and can provide bulldozer operator training in ten locations around the country. ATS Heavy Equipment Operators Schools has been accredited to deliver heavy equipment training for many years. We have a reputation for producing well trained work ready operators – in fact, we have many businesses coming to us looking for new operators. Our ten training centers are located in:

• Sun Prairie, Wisconsin;
• Columbus, Ohio;
• Brentwood, New Hampshire;
• Rapidan, Virginia;
• Pelzer, South Carolina;
• Lecanto, Florida;
• Wills Point, Texas;
• Watkins, Colorado;
• Victorville, California ; and
• Eldorado Hills, California.

When it comes to funding your bulldozer training, we can help out there as well. Fill in an online loan application and we will process it and get back to you – often within 48 hours ( a little longer for weekends).

Are you looking at the role of a bulldozer operator as a possible career? Let ATS Heavy Equipment Operators Schools help you take the first steps.

According to many former students, the singe factor affecting their employment options was their choice of training. Why? In most cases, that was the feedback from the employer. Heavy equipment training organizations develop a reputation. It is this reputation that employers look at when deciding who to hire – pick the wrong training organization, and you may find yourself unemployable.

This is not unique to heavy equipment training. Take a look at most professions and you will find some training providers who are highly regarded, and others who are looked upon poorly. ATS Heavy Equipment Operator Schools has worked hard over the years developing a trust between those who hire operators and their training schools. Based on this trust, our graduates are looked upon quite favorably when it comes to applying for positions.

There are several factors that go into building a solid reputation. Time is important – we have only been in operation for forty years – do you think we may have learned a thing or two ourselves in that time? We have – we have learned what employers want.

The second factor is to deliver training that is industry accredited. This means that employers know that graduates will leave our training schools with a certain level of skills – the employer doesn’t have to guess what your skill level is.

The third factor – our actual training. When we say that someone has completed and passed their training – they have. Individuals cannot pay their money, turn up for the first and last days then expect to pass – you have to do the work to complete the course – there are no bought qualifications at ATS.

Employers know who they want to employ. Your choice of training will determine whether or not you meet their criteria. Add ATS Heavy Equipment Operator Schools to your list of possible training providers. Check us out and I think you will agree that undertaking heavy equipment training through us – is by far the right choice.

With the economy starting to rebuild, a lot of individuals are resorting to agencies to help them rebuild their own lives. If you’re an agency operator, or perhaps an agency employee – have you considered referring your clients to a career as a heavy equipment operator, truck driver or crane operator? With a lot of money being thrown into construction at present the need for operators and drivers is growing substantially.

Heavy equipment careers are not restricted by age, gender or race, making these careers one of the true non-discriminatory work-forces around. Average incomes for these careers range from $35,000 for commercial truck drivers, around $37,000 for heavy equipment operators and $39,000 for crane operators. Top operators can earn in excess of $60,000 per year making them one of the best paid in the industry.

There are several benefits to referring your clients to ATS Heavy Equipment Schools. Training can be completed in three weeks and ATS has a follow up job placement program designed to help graduates find employment in their chosen field. For agencies looking for outcomes, placing clients into training where the training provider also helps to find employment can be a real bonus – the training provider is doing a lot of the work for you.

If you think you may have clients that could be well suited to careers in heavy equipment, crane operations or truck driving, contact us for an agency pack that contains a video, brochure and other relevant information to help you and your clients select the right training program for their future.

Generally speaking, heavy equipment training is well regarded with most training organizations taking the time to undertake accreditation. There are, however, some people who offer to deliver training without any training credentials at all. Gaining certification under those circumstances will almost result in an expensive yet worthless piece of paper.

If the training organization is accredited then you know that your certification is going to be recognized by potential employers nationwide. This is important, particularly in areas such as crane operator training where state legislation has made certification compulsory before you can work in that field.

So what is accreditation? This is a process where training organizations meet a set of minimum criteria. These standards include the material taught, the qualifications of the trainers, the type of equipment used in training, and a standardized set of assessments. In the latter, that is important since this means that all training organizations are assessing students for common skills.

If the organization meets the minimum standards set (and they are high standards) then that training organization can deliver training, undertake assessments, and issue national certification documents.

One accreditation body is The National Center for Construction Education and Research or NCCER. They have been accrediting training organizations since 1995 when it was established by 11 of the world’s largest and most progressive construction companies and several national construction associations.

Before you undertake any form of heavy equipment training, check the training provider to ensure they are accredited and that the certification they provide is recognized across the nation. This will ensure that on completion of your training, you will have a valuable document in your hands instead of a very expensive piece of scrap paper.

Heavy equipment can be divided into two distinct fields; machinery that can multi-task and machinery that is designed to do a specific task. Bulldozers, backhoes and loaders can all multi-task. Graders fit into the role of dedicated machinery and so too does a scraper.

Scrapers are cumbersome-looking machines but their ability to their dedicated job is by no means cumbersome. They only have the one task – to scrape the surface of the earth in preparation for a building project. The majority of these projects are road work related.

The scraper slices across the top of the earth like a knife across butter. Once the scraper has completed the task of leveling out the surface, a grader is then applied to do the fine tuning of the construction bed. Without the scraper, a construction crew would need to rely on a bulldozer or similar to scrape away the surface.

Most heavy equipment machinery like bulldozers do more than just scrape the earth. They can tear big gashes in the work area, gashes that need more work to repair before the site is considered ready to work on.

As you can see from the photo, scrapers are reasonably large and certainly look cumbersome. Learning to operate a scraper is not that difficult and is often included as part of a heavy equipment training program. If you are able to undertake scraper operator training then I suggest you do. With the millions of miles of roads and highways being built as part of the economic stimulus package, gaining a qualification that includes scrapers makes a lot of sense.

We unfortunately live in a society where, despite standards and accreditation procedures, there are some heavy equipment training schools that just don’t make the grade. Gaining a qualification is not exactly cheap – in fact, if you come across a training program that is cheap – be careful, it may be cheap in more ways than one. So what should you look for in a heavy equipment training school?

I said there are standards and accreditation processes. It is obvious that these should be your first check. Are they accredited and do they meet the minimum standards required. However, you should do your own quality assessment and this can be done quickly using some of these guides:

Heavy equipment

There are two things to look at when it comes to the machinery itself. Is the heavy equipment reasonably modern and well maintained, or does it look like it’s been around every construction yard in the country? You don’t necessarily want every machine to be modern. You do need some experience on some of the older machines since the workplace is going to be full of machines of various ages and conditions.

The second think to look at when it comes to heavy equipment is the range. Do they have a broad range of machinery types, or are you going to be stuck behind a bobcat with a variety of attachments? Variety is the spice of training – by that I mean a variety of machinery, not attachments.

Training Area

Is the training area dedicated – or just part of the car park. Is it large and does it contain a variety of materials such as sand, gravel and rock. If you are going to train on a bulldozer, you want real earth to shift – not a pile of sand in the middle of the car park.

The Classroom

As much as we hate being in a classroom, every job has its theoretical components and that requires a specialist classroom – not the company’s lunch room. Equipment such as video players and overhead projectors will give you an indication of their professionalism.

Training Support

Is there a dedicated administration area? This is important. You want your training records stored for future reference. If there is no dedicated admin area, or admin staff, what is going to happen to your records once the heavy equipment training program has been completed? Will they be thrown in a pile in the corner, filed in the shredder, or carefully stored for future access?

These are minimum standards that you can check, often by just eyeballing the training center from the carpark. If you are satisfied with what you see, and the organization is accredited to deliver and assess heavy equipment training, you can consider enrolling and chances are, you will come out the other side a professional heavy equipment operator ready to hit the workforce. Oh yes – do they have a professional job placement service as well?

Heavy equipment training is not the same everywhere. As with any business, you have good operators and poor operators and many that fall somewhere in between. So what is validating and how do you do it? The term validating in this case refers to checking the suitableness of the training to your needs. This involves checking the training methods and ensuring the credibility of the training itself.

The next question is how to validate your training. Your first step has to be to talk to the training organization to determine how they deliver their training. The second step is to talk to former students to get their feedback on heavy equipment training. This can be difficult. However, good training organizations will have testimonials in either written or video format. The most reliable are the video format testimonials – you can read people’s faces as they talk to gauge how honest the testimonial is.

If you’re fortunate, you may even get to talk to the end users, the employers. They are the people who can really tell you how effective the training has been. If you can’t actually talk to the employers, you can at least get an indication of how successful a heavy equipment training organization is by the list of employers on their job’s database – if they have one.

ATS Heavy Equipment Operators Schools are not the only organization offering training in this field. However, when it comes to validating your training, you can talk to us, you can review video testimonials from former students, and we do have a large group of satisfied employers on our jobs database. We also go one step further by offering free online training. This is a unique opportunity to get a feel for heavy equipment training – all in your own home at your own pace. Before undertaking heavy equipment training – get some form of validation – it is time well spent.

Training on loaders used to be so boring. It often relied on you simply spending hours on end moving a pile of earth from A to B and when you were finished, moving it back again. These days, training on loaders has become far more interesting and doesn’t just rely on building hours in a loader operator’s seat.

When you undertake loader training now you find the course far more comprehensive and interesting than in years gone by. There is a requirement for you to undertake safety training – a requirement that could prevent you from entering a construction site unless you have completed it.

Safety of course is one issue. Now, when you get out into the field and work as a loader operator you are expected to know a lot more than just how to move that pile of dirt. There are basic, and sometimes not so basic, general equipment maintenance tasks and inspections that need to be undertaken – often on a daily basis.

Loader training now goes beyond simply operating a loader. Most heavy equipment training programs also include instruction on other machines such as a bulldozer, grader and backhoe. For the student, this has several benefits. First, and most importantly, you are not restricted to just one machine. You can obtain employment operating a much wider range of equipment.

Even if you wanted to specialize on a loader, knowing how other equipment works, what their limitations are and how they handle gives you a much better understanding of that equipment when they are working around you on a construction or mining site.

Today’s construction sites are often very different to those of the past. Operators move between various types of heavy equipment, particularly when construction is going on around the clock. If you’re looking for wheel loader training then contact the very best in the business – ATS Heavy Equipment Operator Schools. We will get you started in the career of your choice.

The introduction of new equipment and new technology can often bring operational difficulties. This is particularly true for heavy equipment like bulldozers, excavators, and graders. The introduction of GPS is one such technology that was discussed in yesterday’s post. Other technologies include the introduction of computer systems, particularly those that help to monitor and optimize hydraulic fluids.

Many businesses are able to take up training offers made by the manufacturers of these machines. Others are either not in a position to take up any offers, find them too expensive, or, in many cases, are simply not offered any training – they are just handed instruction booklets.

Associated Training Services has a specialized division – ATS Specialized Training – that offers specialized training to businesses across the nation. Your employees can be trained at either one of ATS’s training schools or at the employee’s workplace. Training is designed to meet the particular needs of the business taking into account the type of equipment used and the type of work undertaken by that equipment.

Employees can also be assessed using nationally accredited assessment criteria. These criteria have been set by organizations such as the National Center for Construction Education and Research (NCCER), OSHA, and MSHA. For crane operators, they can be assessed using NCCCO criteria to become certified crane operators. This is a compulsory requirement in some states.

Specialized heavy equipment training is not for every employer. However, when undertaken as a workgroup, it can increase productivity and decrease accidents and downtime. Contact us at 1.800.678.8120 or through our website for more information on specialized heavy equipment training.