Auto collision repair is about a lot more than fixing dents.
The way Joe Kircher sees it, auto collision repair is about having a knack for technical precision, an openness to evolving technology and a meticulous eye for craftsmanship.
As department chair of the Auto Collision Repair and Refinish Technology program at Fox Valley Technical College, Joe recently joined WHBY’s Hayley Tenpas to talk about the in-demand associate degree program.
Joe shared his own journey from FVTC student to industry professional to instructor and explains how the program builds students’ skills from the ground up by combining mechanical knowledge with an eye for detail.
Tap the video to listen to the interview or scroll down to read the transcript.
Tenpas: Welcome back to Focus Fox Valley. Right now, our Focus on Careers with Fox Valley Technical College, helping you connect with careers of promise throughout the Fox Cities. And I was just talking shop with Joe Kircher here, a department chair of the Auto Collision Repair programs at Fox Valley Technical College. Of course, if you’re driving, you are likely to interact with this area quite often if there’s ever trouble with your vehicle. Or you just got a car question. But today, we’re not necessarily being car detectives, but we’re going to tell you about the program that helps train those car detectives out there. And again, auto collision repair is what we’re highlighting here today. Joe, welcome to Focus Fox Valley.
Kircher: Well, thank you for having me.
Tenpas: All right. Well, we’re going to highlight how you got to where you are today. Tell us a little bit about your career trajectory. And when you landed at Fox Valley Tech.
Kircher: Well, it’s an interesting story. And I tell my students every year when they come into my program, so I started at Fox Valley Tech. I graduated from high school and I wasn’t sure what I was going to do. And I liked art and I’m like, well, where am I going to go? What am I going to do? And I enrolled in the automotive program at Fox Valley Tech, had an opportunity to work through the mechanical program, a two-year program. And yeah, I liked it, but it wasn’t quite what I was looking for.
Then I enrolled in the collision program. So that kind of started my collision side of the background of it. And for some of you that have heard of Kenny Kempfer, he was one of my instructors back in the day. So, some of you if you listen to the programs in the past.
Tenpas: What’s under…
Kircher: The hood? What’s under the hood? Um, so it was cool because he planted the seed for me when I went to school there. He said, someday I’m going to retire and somebody’s going to have to take my position. And that planted the seed way back then, that, hey, I think I do want to be an instructor someday at Fox Valley Tech. So I made full circle. I went out in the industry, worked for Bergstrom Automotive for many years. I had a great career with them. But the calling was still there to go back to being an instructor. I had an opportunity to work at night as an instructor, as an adjunct, and then an opportunity opened. I won’t say, I guess I’m going to say it, at a Green Bay area Technical College. Sure. So I had an opportunity to work there. And then, you know, a position opened at Fox Valley Tech and that brought me back.
Tenpas: So all part of the journey.
Kircher: All parts of the journey. Yes.
Tenpas: Yeah. So we will narrow in though, in on the Auto Collision Repair and refinish technology program, a two-year associate degree. Correct? Correct. What are students, , walking through? What are they learning in those two years?
Kircher: So we start basic. The very basic of what are screwdrivers. What are tools? It’s been a generational change; when I went to school, you knew what those things were. So now we start you out basic. What are hand tools? What are these tools that are in the toolbox? So that’s the first part of it. And then we start working you in basic dent repair. Some of you are familiar with the idea of a softball hitting the car. What is that process of repairing? So we work with students through that and how to repair the dents, then how to refinish, color match to make sure that that color is what you expect from your vehicle, that it’s not two colors driving down the street. Folks, there are cars and if you take a good look at a stoplight and you look closely, you’ll see the color difference. That’s what we teach in making sure those colors are correct.
Tenpas: You know, I remember my dad and you know, my dad, Randy, he always kept a little what looked like a nail polish bottle in the glove compartment of his old red truck, the truck that he drove for decades. And if you ever had a little scratch, I remember him, you know, being out there with that little nail polish container, fixing it.
Kircher: So, folks, that brings up a great one. When I worked at Bergstrom, we talked about that with our guests, with brand new cars. Touch up those chips right away. Right. Because that’s where the rust starts.
Tenpas: That’s where the rust starts. If you ever need a vehicle to get some dents out, I’ve got one. I can volunteer for you. Everybody has it as well.
Kircher: So after we work through that, we get into structural repair, which a lot of shops shy away from because they don’t understand that process. And you think, well, structural I don’t want it. Well, it’s as simple as what we call radiator core support. It’s what’s in front of the car that holds your radiator and condenser. Well, if a deer hits, you’re going to damage that and it needs to be replaced. That’s considered a structural component. So we walk our students through that process on how to repair it and how to repair it properly and making sure that everything lines up within three millimeters. Everything’s got to be exact. It’s like your foundation on your house. If that isn’t right, the rest of the building isn’t. And if your foundation of your vehicle isn’t right, the rest of the vehicle — the headlights are not going to fit, the bumpers are not going to fit the hoods, not going to fit on the vehicle properly. So after that is all said and done, we get you through that structural component.
But there’s still the mechanical component for some of you folks that have hit a curb. That’s the mechanical side of it, right? That wheel gets ripped off, gets damaged. If you hit a curb, do not take it to a mechanic. That is a collision. And that’s what we train. We’re experts at identifying what is damaged and what needs to be replaced. Again, on the mechanical side, we sometimes just guess and that’s the difference between when you start looking at mechanical versus collision. We must know if it’s collision related. What got damaged from that collision. Where did that energy go?
Tenpas: No, that’s interesting. And it makes me think, you know collisions kind of the bones the structure. Right. And mechanics is the organs and how and how that’s all working in the body.
Kircher: I love that analogy. I look at that analogy all the time.
Tenpas: Cool, right?
Kircher: Yeah, that’s exactly what it is.
Tenpas: So you’ve got a great space that you’re teaching students in. I want to ask about the JJ Keller Transportation Center and technology. I would also imagine evolving over the years as our vehicles have become computerized and evolved so much as well.
Kircher: Yes, I’m going to say hats off to our taxpayer base here in the Fox Cities that support the college. Without you folks, we don’t have the technology that we need to train properly. We had a gentleman come in today from Hudson, just by Minnesota there… to look at our program. And why he’s looking at our program is because of the technology that we have. We have the latest and greatest. We have a piece of equipment we just bought last year. And it’s for what we call ADAS, advanced driver assist systems. If you folks have heard about cars that drive themselves, there is technology there that for us to– let’s say your mirror gets knocked off your car, there’s a camera in there and we must reprogram that camera so it’s aimed correctly. So it sees the 360 around the car; so the car knows if there’s some danger around it. Without that technology at Fox Valley Tech, those cars are not right. You’re going to a shop and they’re putting a mirror on, and it doesn’t throw a check engine light on, doesn’t throw any lights on the dash but the car. It’s not going to work properly. So with that technology we just installed this year we’re probably one of three in the country that has it and can do that. We just went through training last week on how to properly train the rest of the industry on that. So, it’s here and as an industry we’re lacking, but Fox Valley Tech is right there.
We’re always there for that cutting edge and trying to make sure we’re teaching and we’re not there waiting for somebody to say, hey, aren’t you supposed to be teaching this? So that’s one piece of equipment on the cutting edge of that making sure things are measured properly. What does that look like? Paint mixing systems. Making sure color matches. Again, I can’t say enough about the management over there, the taxpayer base and making sure that we have the right equipment. Some technical colleges that I’ve been part of or have seen do not have the equipment that we have. So it’s impressive.
Tenpas: Very impressive. We’ll pause here, but we’ll talk about that ideal student that you are working with and teaching as we focus on careers.
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We are focusing on careers with Fox Valley Tech, highlighting the Auto Collision Repair and Refinishing technology program with Joe Kircher, department chair. All right, Joe, who is perfect for this program, what kind of student are you looking for?
Kircher: So me and my other instructor, there’s two of us, and in a two-year program we look for that person that has that art skill. Again, it’s for anybody. But if you really are, you know, interested in automotive, have an art background, like sculpting or design. Those tend to be our students that come to it. I think about a student I had 17 years ago… Great, loved drawing, did great drawings, and he came to the school and I said, you’re in the right place. Seventeen years later, he is. He just reached out to me last week, still drawing but working on collision damage vehicles. So, that seems to be the right person that likes to work with their hands. Anything like that. Motorcycles, lawnmowers. Any of that… who love to play with that stuff. That tends to be our students.
Tenpas: I really love the art category that you’ve put this in though, because it is a work of art. And like you mentioned, if things are off just slightly, the whole piece comes apart.
Kircher: Exactly. And you think about colors, right? You must have that eye for the color because some of you will look at something and say, well, that’s silver; silver is silver. No, there’s hundreds and hundreds of different silvers. And how that changes and tones and things like that. I’ve had some great students come up with some great designs on just colors. I think back on what we had, we did these bowling pins and did murals on the bowling pins with automotive paint and some of the stuff that our students were able to do, and again, it gets them excited. Right? Because that brings out that art and craft out of them.
Tenpas: So absolutely… and hiring is going well for students in this industry as well.
Kircher: Yes, yes. There is a constant need. We have a lot of folks retiring. And then to have that skill level of the mechanical slash technical skills, that’s huge right now. But yeah, if they need a job, we can get them a job. Students come to our program without jobs; we get them jobs.
In the industry, we have what’s called a co-op program where they can work more out in industry with a mentor and be at school less time. And they can choose that. We can have it where they’re at school four days a week, Monday through Thursday, usually from 730 to 12. So that gets them out in the afternoon and on Fridays to work. And then if they do the co-op program, they might be there for just two days and then the rest of the week working. So it helps our employers because they’re there. They’re screaming for folks because they need folks. It gets that student out working in real life situations, right? And keeps them moving through. What’s nice is the employers get to mold them in their process as the way they want. Right. We teach them the basic skills. Employers mold them into their processes and what they want.
Tenpas: And you never know what you’re going to get out there in the real world. That’s a great learning and opportunity right there.
Kircher: Yes. I go back to the students that we have. I like to bring that up fresh out of high school. We have folks returning from industry someplace else. Maybe manufacturing and looking for a career. I have military folks retired out of military. I had a gentleman that retired from the military two years ago, and he wanted to do this for himself, and he came through the program. He said, nope, Joe, I’m just doing this for myself. So, folks, if you are hearing this, you can do this just for yourself. And he ended up working in the industry. He said, you know what?” I love it so much. And he went out and got a job in the industry as well.
Tenpas: Get paid for it.
Kircher: Might as well get paid for it. I’ve had several retired folks come through the program and just do it for themselves. What does that look like for them? I want to work on this car that I have, and I say collision program. But we give you the basics to work on restoration stuff, folks, if you want to work on that. Some of you have heard of 0 to 60 out in Sherwood. They work on Porsches. That’s all they do and restoration. I’ve had many students go through our collision program and work for them, and they’re nationally known. So there are so many opportunities but so many diverse types of students. We are almost at 50% females versus males coming through the program. When I started, that was probably 10%. Now we’re finally seeing that grow. And I’ll ask you, what do you think is better at a collision technician, a female, or a male?
Tenpas: Oh, I’m going to say women all the way.
Kircher: Okay. And you’re absolutely right. And the reason is, is.
Tenpas: They have attention to detail.
Kircher: There it is. There it is. Yeah, there are so my female students who do so much better after they’ve graduated through the program because they’re taking notes and they’re paying attention to every little detail. And they go out and they’re very successful because they can go back to their notes because they pay attention to that detail.
Tenpas: So that doesn’t surprise me at all. Joe, I want to make sure our listeners know how to connect with the program. You can visit fvtc.edu to learn more.
Joe, great to talk with you, and thanks for some of the great memory flashbacks to Under the Hood.
Kircher: Thank you, Hayley.
