Hello, I’m Daren Michener and I am a second year Electrical Engineering student here at Western. During the past summer I completed a summer Co-op placement at La Cia McCormick Canada, owner of the Club House brand. In case you don’t recognize the company, they are the makers Montreal Steak Spice.
The job posed many challenges, which in the end were very rewarding. McCormick Canada uses many machines to mix and package it’s products, and on occasion a machines would stop working and with it, the rest of the assembly line. For some of these situations the maintenance staff would call upon me to help diagnose the problem. At first these situations were stressful and somewhat frightening. In the end though the reward was well worth it, either I would learn something from the maintenance staff and or I was able to find the fault.
The majority of my time was spent on various circuit design and programming projects. I learned a lot about various safety circuits and components such as safety controllers with circuit monitoring capabilities. I also had the opportunity to program Programmable Logic Controllers, PCLs, and industrial touch screens. These projects took many hours to complete but at the end of the day it felt really good to see my programs running a machine and actually controlling the components in the machine.
Working for McCormick Canada was an enjoyable, not to mention, beneficial experience. I have found that employers like to see applicants with work experience and Co-op helps provide that before I graduate, helping me to be more competitive in the job market. Over the summer I was able to apply skills learned in school and most importantly, I was able to further confirm my career choice in Electrical Engineering.
Good luck with your job hunting,
Daren
Only real men wear hair nets.
Great blog, your co-op projects sound quite impressive!
Posted by: Robyn Hicock | 12/03/2009 at 04:07 AM