A single mom with five children, Bobbi Pauly-Williams is finally seeing the light at the end of the tunnel.

About a year and a half ago, shortly after the birth of her fifth child, Pauly-Williams found herself in a situation where she couldn't stay married any longer. With that decision came the realization that she was now going to be the sole provider for all of her children.

Over the years, Pauly-Williams was a stay-at-home mom and had only taken on a few odd jobs here and there. She had a few college credits, but nothing that would help her get the good-paying job she now needed."I needed to find something to keep my home," Pauly-Williams said, "something to support my kids and just move on."

Through some research and reading various job advertisements, she discovered the local demand for sheetmetal workers.

"I was very determined and very pointed to go through sheetmetal," she explains. "Sheetmetal is probably one of the most in-demand occupations in Wichita. I thought this would help secure a job and make sure I have a job for the next 30 years. That's the number one reason why I focused on sheetmetal."

Pauly-Williams credits much of her success to Wichita Area Technical College (WATC) and the great instructors, "I definitely owe a lot to Chris Cotton (instructor, Aircraft Sheetmetal/Aerostructures Technician). He prepared us for aircraft and what we'd run across."

Within three days of completing the course at WATC at the end of January, Pauly-Williams had three calls for interviews and potential job offers. She hired on with Cessna Aircraft Company the next week. She started working full time by the beginning of March and was making $13.48 an hour — almost $4 an hour more than she had ever made before.

"I'm doing even better than I thought I would," she admits. "And that's all thanks to the instruction from Chris Cotton and the motivation he provided."

Education has no age limits.

Just ask 57-year-old Terry Ballinger, a January graduate of Wichita Area Technical College (WATC).

In 1973, Ballinger received his first college education from Wichita State University where he obtained a bachelor's degree in business economics. He continued his career at Dillons, but in a management position, where he was employed for a total of 31 years. Following this, he took a similar position at a food chain in Virginia where he stayed for seven more years.

Ballinger and his wife then moved back to Wichita to be closer to family and he took a job with Ryan Air National Airlines, "I really liked the work. I enjoyed it. I thought I was going to be there forever, until I retired."

But the company was bought out and moved to Chicago.

"They said if you want your job, you can move to Chicago," Ballinger recalls. "I just quit a job to move to Wichita to be with family, I wasn't about to move to Chicago. So I started looking for work, and had a hard time finding something."

A friend of Ballinger's informed him of a grant scholarship to WATC that was available for displaced workers and mentioned the fact that aviation companies are hiring at an unbelievable rate.

Ballinger checked into the information he was given and soon found himself pursuing a technical certificate — quite an experience considering he hadn't been to school in over 30 years. He made it through with flying colors though and immediately received five job offers — four of these were from the major airplane manufacturers.

Cessna made the offer he couldn't refuse — first shift, Monday–Friday, "This is the first job in my entire life where I had Saturdays and Sundays off," he commented.

As an added bonus, Ballinger is enjoying his new-found career even more than he originally thought, "When you're working for a company for 31 years like I did with Dillons, you get to a point where you're comfortable and you know everything," he says. "Everyday I go out to work at Cessna on something new and something challenging because there's so much that I don't know — I like the challenge."

Who knew machining could be so fun? Machining Technology 2006 graduate Bobby Phengvongsa is filled with excitement and passion for his new career and can’t think of anything he’d rather be doing for a living.

Phengvongsa didn’t always know what career path to take, but a job he had taken in a family friend’s machine shop revealed many possibilities. “I saw so many opportunities in the machining field so I thought I’d give it a shot. I had very little experience but had a passion for it and picked it up right away.”

The same family friend guided Phengvongsa to WATC to receive his educational training and he’s very glad he did. “The programs and equipment [WATC has] are excellent. Nowhere in the state of Kansas does any school have the equipment like WATC, the new Haas Automation lab equipped with three and five axis CNC mills and CNC lathes — it’s great!”

Getting his technical certificate in Machining Technology proved to be fairly simple too. “The program was only two semesters, so it didn’t take very long to complete.”

After completing the program at WATC, Phengvongsa found it easy to obtain his first position as well. “WATC set employers up to come in and interview graduates. The school had it lined up for everyone. The interviews were there, you just had to take them up on it. The school helped me out a lot. If I didn’t have those interviews, I might not have gotten a job so quickly.”

Phengvongsa was hired by Spirit AeroSystems through those interviews as a manufacturing engineer, project planner. “He got hired at a level above his educational level and is doing great. He’s a real success,” compliments WATC Machining Technology instructor Rick Shipman.

The chances of moving up within the company look good too. Right now Phengvongsa’s position as project planner is right below the engineer who draws the plans. All he needs to move up is a little more education, and luckily, the company he works for is willing to pay for his additional training.

“Right now I’m doing better than I expected. I’m doing really good where I’m at. The pay is good — the pay is really good,” he says and encourages anyone to get into this industry. “Don’t give up. It’s basic math, nothing complicated, so don’t be intimidated. You can dream it, then draw it and make it. It’s great.”