Community College or CDL mill

How do I know so much? It's called homework. Before I chose a school I went to THECs website and I read. I spent my time reading material that actually mattered from the actual governening body that regulates schools....all of em. It even says it at the bottom of every schools website and they provide the link of where to go to research and check the schools credentials.

Guess what, the link isn't to this website.

You can actually get all the info you need to know in about 2 hours of reading and phone calls. That might actually surprise people that like to come to message boards to make carrier choices.

That's great, you visited both facilities......and you should have. To say that because you visited one private school and one state school and what you saw somehow implies that it is that way across the board is disingenuous at best.

Every state school is different. Every private school is different.

LOL.....state schools put their reputation on line?!?!? They are quasi government agencies. They run as well and as efficient as a DMV office. Since when have you stood in line at the post office and thought, "Wow, what excellent service I am receiving!" they receive state funding and therefore don't have to perform at the levels a private school has to. Private schools get a bad rep and students stop showing up. Student stop showing up and businesses close doors.

Why would a private business owned by a diligent business owner want to dump all their money, invest all their time and their financial future into a business just to drive it into the ground by not taking care of his customers?


Receive kickbacks? Really, are you serious? This is the cluelessness I'm talking about.


Lastly, you want to talk about vested interest? The school I went to financed me almost 100%. THEY financed me. They didn't sell my student loan off to a big finance company. They didn't receive PEL money, state money, WIA money. My payments were made every month straight to the school. They put their money where their mouth is. They invested in me.

No state school gives a #### about your success cause they get paid and their doors stay open either way.


I come here because trucking has been great to me. It's not always the best, it's hard work. But when I was down it got me out of a deep hole when nothing else was available to me. I want other people to have that same option and make their choices wisely.


I'm not here to advertise for anyone. I won't even tell you where I went or where someone should go to school. Everyone should make their own choice. But they should do it armed with more and better information than what they read here.

 

I just hope that one day I'm as "smart" as you are, or you think you are.

But then I probably won't ever be because I don't think that I'm smarter on a topic than people who have been involved in it for decades when I have no experience in it.

Bottom line, you seem to think that you're smarter than everyone else here, and then turn around and make statements that prove that's just not true.

For instance, you use "absolute phrases" like "every, "everyone" and "all" -- really intelligent people don't use that phraseology in their statements.

You said that "It even says it at the bottom of every schools website and they provide the link of where to go to research and check the schools credentials."

That's a blatantly false statement. How can I say that? Because I looked on the sites of a number of the schools for which the THEC provides these reports, that you seem to think are so valuable, and there were no such references to the THEC or links to the THEC site. In fact, it seems that most DON'T have such links. But that doesn't even matter because only one not having such a reference or link was enough to discredit your statement because you used an "absolute" and said "It even says it at the bottom of EVERY schools website". BTW, it's "school's" not "schools", as you were using it in the possessive form.

Also, really intelligent people don't make the type of broad assumptions like you do.

Especially not broad assumptions based on a couple of postings on a website like you make.

Here's one example. You keep referring to the cluelessness and misinformation here and talk about this site as if the people who come here are using it as their sole source of information on the topic they ask about.

You go so far as to make ridiculous assertions like "Wanna know why 60% of all drivers abandoned trucking in their first 6 months? Because they come to websites like this and listen to advice from people that are clueless."

You have no way to know how many drivers actually "abandoned trucking in their first 6 months" or why people leave the industry much less whether or not it's due to their use of "websites like this and listen to advice from people that are clueless."

I ask again, if this site is so worthless and the opinions (and that's what they are BTW) expressed by the clueless people here are filled with such misinformation, why are you here? You seem to be like Grouch Marx who is quoted as saying "I wouldn't want to be a member of any club that would accept me as a member."

Intelligent people cite meaningful data that they can use to produce actual information from credible sources. You on the other hand discredit your own sources and seem to accept statistics as "facts" when they can be easily manipulated, especially when they are self reported.

For example, I find it hilarious that you refer to the THEC, as if they are some un-impeachable source of information, and then turn around and criticize a community college for being a quasi government agency and cite inefficiencies and inadequacies in government agencies.

What do you think the THEC is, some privately sponsored think tank? Nope. They're a commission, a state commission a government agency.

By discrediting community colleges, you just discredited the very "institution" whose "reports" you say you based your decisions on.

And by the way, the reports THEC reports are little more than demographic and attendance information. They provide NO INSIGHT into the QUALITY of the institution or the instruction provided there.

From their own website: "DPSA only computes the completion rate, not the graduation rate. Our purpose is to take a snapshot of institutional enrollment, completion and placement performance over a reporting fiscal year; it is not to track graduation of a particular cohort year."

Rather they are just statistics, probably provided to the "audit committee" by the schools themselves.

And you know what they say about statistics (because you know everything): "There are lies, #### lies and statistics."

BTW, just FYI I only visited two schools, because that's all there is convenient to me. But I read up on about a dozen more when I was trying to determine if it would be of significant enough value to me to travel out of my area for training.

So, I based my decision on the following, in no order of preference or weighting:

1) actual former students' opinions of the training they received, given freely on boards like this one

2) information provided by the schools themselves (a little over a dozen of them)

3) talking with the companies where I want to drive

4) site visits to the institutions themselves (the 2 in my area)

5) general information comparing programs between (in all areas not just truck driving programs) "for profit schools" and community colleges

As for the "kickbacks" thing, you should talk with some people who used to work in some of these for-profit driving "academies". I know a few folks who used to work at a couple of the national franchised schools and they were consistent in stating that their schools did in fact receive "referral fees" from various companies. I heard this from 3-4 former employees of such schools. Had I just heard it from one, I wouldn't have given it much credibility. But then I heard it from the second one and the third . . .

So, I applied the old rule that "One is a data point, two could be coincidence, but three begins a trend."

You asked: "Why would a private business owned by a diligent business owner want to dump all their money, invest all their time and their financial future into a business just to drive it into the ground by not taking care of his customers?"

Of course, I'm not saying that a private business would do that, and your assertion that I was is absurd.

But for-profit schools have a profit motive that community colleges don't have. Thus, their goal is to provide the training at the lowest cost possible to them, period.

It's the same argument/reason why the for-profit universities are coming under such scrutiny of late. Many are little more than diploma mills. But then I guess you think that an MBA from the University of Phoenix is just as good and as acceptable as one from say the University of Arizona, huh?

In most areas, there's absolutely nothing wrong with a private company having a profit motive, nothing at all. But the educational environment is very different than the typical business pursuit.

In general, I find your hubris displayed here as both unwarranted and insulting to those who participate on the boards here, most of whom are here to help others in their industry. And for you to come on here and denigrate them as being "clueless", is the height of hubris. Especially given the fact that you have a fraction of the experience in this industry of most of the other posters.

In closing, I think that it might be helpful for you to Google the "Dunning-Kroeger effect", while I'm no psychologist/psychiatrist , you might find it interesting reading.

I'm sure you'll go far in this industry that is so new to you by thinking that you know more than those around you and that only your way is the correct way.

I wish you all the best.

 

Let's address your Statement one issue at a time.

Can you show me one school in Tennessee that doesn't have THECs info linked on their website?

Here's all the private schools I could find in Tennessee.

http://www.roadmaster.com/truck_school_Chattanooga_Tennessee.php

http://www.smti-inc.com/

http://tennesseetruckdrivingschool.com/ttds/

http://www.drivebigtrucks.com/locations/murfreesboro-tn/

http://www.unitedtruckschool.net/


Every one has THEC linked right off their front page. In fact, it's state law, they have NO CHOICE.

In fact the only website I could find that doesn't have the info posted on the site is Tennessee tech. The state school in direct violation of state law.

LOL

So your first accusation against me is completely wrong and your assertion is wrong. Why go further?


I don't think everyone on this site is clueless, just some.



Oh, in 2010 ttc in Knoxville reported 83% graduation and 61% job placement.

In comparison TDI reports the same level graduated but an 84% placement rate. That tells me TN Tech takes whatever comes their way and allows unqualified drivers to waste their time and money to attend the school.

SMTI and TTDS are both private and have a 100% job placement ratio for all graduates.


Or do you believe they would lie to THEC and get their license pulled as a result.

 

You need to do some more homework . It doesn't matter what kind of rep a private school has . They'll keep getting students because there's a sucker born every minute .
"Why would a private business owned by a diligent business owner want to dump all their money, invest all their time and their financial future into a business just to drive it into the ground by not taking care of his customers?"
Are you referring to CDL mills ? Taking care of their customers ? If they carefully selected students that only had true potential to become drivers and gave them adequate training they would not train a fraction of the students they train now . They stay profitable by sending a bunch of rejects to trucking companies knowing they won't last 6 months and replacements will be needed .
People with any sense are armed with better information they get here . Most people going to CDL mills are throwing the money away . They won't make it in the industry . Somebody better have a good job lined up before making the commitment and that doesn't mean prehire letters . Did your phone calls and reading elsewhere tell you prehires are meaningless ? Did they tell you turnover rates of the carriers that send recruiters to school ?
When you've been around a year or so we might listen to you . Right now you're just blowing smoke .

 

You brought up the same argument on the other thread.

How are these schools reporting 80-100% job placement ratios if they're bringing unqualified drivers into their schools?

How is a school supposed to select students outside of background and qualifications? How is a school supposed to determine a students desire to stay in trucking past 6 months?

I asked you last time how an inexperienced driver is supposed to get a job without having gone through a school and you said they should look for another career.

So because you don't like trucking that means no one should?

 

Do some more homework . Schools with 80% placement rate place students with carriers that have over 80% turnover rate . I'd like to see schools post retention rates of their graduates .
Check the fleet size for the past few years of carriers recruiting from any school . Compare the increase of trucks with the number of students placed with them during that time . Let me know the results .
There are various tests to check the aptitude of potential students . They are used successfully in Europe but why one earth would CDL mills want to use them and reduce their potential income ?
I have known many drivers that got jobs without going through school . None of the drivers that I know went to school . The only driver I knew that went to school was the worst driver I had ever seen . My employer hired him and sent him with me to learn delivery locations . I told him by midday he was not driving my truck anymore . Then while I was in getting bills sign he back my truck in a drainage ditch trying to turn it around .

 

From reading your comments, the fact that you disagree that it's sound advice probably makes it sound advice.

 

The turnover rate has nothing to do with the schools that trained them. How in the heck can you stick that on the school?

What does any school in the country have to do with what a student is going to do 6 months down the road? How can that possibly be predicted? And why on earth does any school have any responsibility to determine what someone might possibly do in the future?

Are we the thought police now? What do we do about the 50% of the students that do stay in it? Not let them in the industry?

You keep saying there are other alternatives to entering a school but the 4 times I've asked you now you refuse to give me an example of an alternative.

Please, without giving me anecdotal stories about drivers that started without formal training VS drivers that did......please give me specifics.

Assume I'm a new entry level applicant that wants to learn to drive and get a job as a CDL driver. Please specifically name a good paying company that will hire me without any experience or a diploma.

 

Would you like to contribute something valuable to the conversation? Like maybe citing something I said that is incorrect?

Maybe?

 

I did give you an alternative and specifics . ALL the drivers I know had no CDL mill training . They were trained by companies where they were already employed doing other work or by companies that would hire and train people that showed potential .
I don't know any company that would hire you personally . I'm not wasting any more time responding to your nonsense .