Johnson Countian Kevin Jennings Turns Training Opportunity Into New Career with Help from Hiring Our Miners Everyday Program
Just a few years ago, Kevin Jennings probably hadn’t thought much about a career outside of coal mining. The industry paid well and jobs were close to home for the Johnson Countian. A career in the advanced manufacturing field was likely the furthest thing from his mind.
But then things changed.
The company Jennings worked for lost a major contract to supply fuel to Kentucky Power Company’s Louisa power plant, which had shuttered its coal-burning capacity. Layoffs became an eventuality.
“They tried to make ends meet and kept us working for five, six, seven years, and they finally just had to shut the operation down in Martin County where I was at,” said Jennings, who had spent 15 years underground, with 10 of them as a foreman.
Jennings lost his mining job in 2017. Like hundreds of former Eastern Kentucky miners before him, Jennings filed a claim for unemployment insurance (UI) benefits. It was during the UI process that he learned about a training program at a new facility in nearby Paintsville called east Kentucky Advanced Manufacturing Institute (eKAMI) where people were being taught skills in advanced manufacturing—skills that could get him on the path to a new career.
Jennings would also learn about a program called Hiring Our Miners Everyday (HOME) that could help him cover the costs to attend eKAMI. Because Jennings was a dislocated coal miner, he qualified for financial assistance through HOME, an initiative of Eastern Kentucky Concentrated Employment Program (EKCEP) that helps former coal industry workers and their spouses affected by the coal industry downturn discover their skills, determine new career options, covers costs for them to enter classroom training, and helps place them into subsidized on-the-job training positions with area employers.
But Jennings said at first he wasn’t sure eKAMI was a good move for him, and actually declined an offer to apply for the program’s inaugural class. But after looking further into the program and doing his own research about the advanced manufacturing field, he decided to apply and was accepted into eKAMI’s second class of trainees.
“It was a great program,” Jennings said. “Best thing, really, that ever happened to me.”
eKAMI was founded by Kathy Walker and officially opened in fall 2017. The institute’s six-month curriculum teaches a variety of skills ranging from old-style fabrication techniques to operating state-of-the-art computer numerical control machines and writing programs to create a range of parts from metal stock.
eKAMI was a step outside of what Jennings had become accustomed to in a mine, but something he was excited to learn.
“Never in my dreams did I imagine what I ended up getting into with Kathy’s program. It’s a spectacular program and a blessing the way it worked out,” Jennings said, adding that he was also fortunate that HOME was available to cover a lot of the costs he incurred while out of work.
For Jennings, HOME covered his tuition to attend eKAMI and also provided important needs-based payments and supportive services to help ensure he was able to focus on his classes and learn the skills he needed. It was necessary assistance, he said, that provided the opportunity for him to attend in the first place.
“If it hadn’t have been for the financial side of it, I never could have went [to eKAMI],” Jennings said. “Because I did have a mortgage and family to provide for.”
HOME was created by EKCEP in 2012 and made possible through a National Emergency Grant funded by the U.S. Department of Labor. Subsequent DOL grant awards have allowed HOME to continue well beyond its initial two-year cycle to provide assistance to hundreds of laid-off miners or their spouses in Eastern Kentucky. Jennings said just in his class alone there were students from Letcher and Knott counties that relied on the assistance HOME provided to attend classes and successfully complete eKAMI’s curriculum.
As for his own career, Jennings is currently working as a project manager for Heartland Automation, a Georgetown, Ky., based company that designs and manufactures AutoGuide Mobile Robots. It’s a job opportunity that Jennings directly attributes to the opportunity he received to attend eKAMI where he was able to learn a new trade and enter a new career upon completing the eKAMI curriculum.
“It definitely provided opportunity for work,” Jennings said, adding that upon graduating the program, he received two job offers—and one from his current employer.
“I’m very happy with the way it’s worked out,” Jennings said.
For more information on ReWork EKY, go to www.ekcep.org EKCEP, a nonprofit workforce development agency headquartered in Hazard, Ky., serves the citizens of 23 Appalachian coalfield counties. The agency provides an array of workforce development services, administers the Hiring Our Miners Everyday (H.O.M.E.) program for dislocated coal miners and their spouses, and is the White House-designated lead organization for the federal TechHire designation for Eastern Kentucky. Learn more about us at http://www.ekcep.org, http://www.jobsight.org and http://www.facebook.com/ekcep.
