Twinsburg Center offers life-changing experiences for students

Angie Rose, sophomore business administration major, and Ryan Pignatiello, sophomore business administration major, study in an empty classroom at the Twinsburg Center, where Tim Keblesh and David Passick, who work at Chrysler, both returned to earn their

Credit: Jason Hall

David Passick’s life changed on Nov. 2, 1992, when he was severely injured while working at the DaimlerChrysler Stamping Plant in Twinsburg. Passick’s right arm was amputated and his career as a skilled tradesman was essentially over.

After three years and a series of surgeries, doctors had reconstructed Passick’s arm as much as possible, and he was finally able to return to work in 1995. Because of his injuries, he feared that continuing to work on the floor in the tool and die department would not be an option.

After transferring to a job at the Chrysler training center in Twinsburg, which shares a building with Kent State Geauga Campus’ Twinsburg Center, Passick decided to begin taking courses and pursue his bachelor’s degree.

Passick and Tim Keblesh are two employees who, for two very different reasons, embraced the opportunity to go back to school and received degrees from Kent State’s Twinsburg Center.

Passick was a tool and die maker by trade. He has worked at Chrysler for 20 years.

After recovering and transferring into the job at the Chrysler training center in Twinsburg, Passick said he was setting up computer labs and networking cables in the labs and was able to observe people taking the courses. He became interested in taking classes on his own and soon enrolled in courses at the Twinsburg Center.

“I would come to work every day, close the office and then go to class,” Passick said. “I was able to get tutoring while I was there, and I also tutored other students.”

Passick said he took mostly evening classes, but Chrysler was flexible when he occasionally needed to take a daytime class.

In returning to school, Passick said that finding the time was the biggest challenge for him to overcome. While he was taking classes, Passick still had a family at home with a son in high school.

“It required a lot more discipline,” Passick said. “Things didn’t come easy for me after being gone 25 or 30 years from high school. It required a lot more effort on my part to stay focused on the task at hand and not get caught up with family problems.”

It took him about five years to graduate magna cum laude with a bachelor’s degree in computer technology.

“It hasn’t changed my job or outlook, but it has changed my opinion on higher education,” Passick said. “Before obtaining my college degree, I was at the top of the line as far as a skilled trades person can go. The Twinsburg Center gave me an opportunity to further my education and not be stuck in one trade.”

He said he now has more options and opportunities available to him.

“There are about 2,000 employees at the plant,” Passick said. “I wonder what would happen if they all had this opportunity.”

Passick is currently two steps away from receiving his second degree from Kent State, an associate’s degree in industrial technology. He also is pursuing Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer certification.

Tim Keblesh, co-administrator of the local DaimlerChrysler training center, said he started his pursuit of a college degree back in the ’80s.

“I’ve been a sheet-metal worker all my life,” Keblesh said. “I was on the construction sites and the engineers were coming out of academia highly trained, but they couldn’t make it work because they didn’t understand the practical applications.

“I couldn’t converse with them because they could talk in theory, but they couldn’t talk in practical applications. They didn’t understand why things didn’t fit the way their paper said it should. I thought if I could get that theoretical application in my mind and compile it together with my practical experience that I could be a dynamo in that arena.”

Keblesh started taking classes in mechanical engineering at the University of Akron in 1984. Because of an untimely divorce and being a single parent, he stopped taking classes.

Keblesh said he started taking computer classes at Kent State after he came to work at Chrysler in 1993.

“The world in the building trades versus the world in the manufacturing plant is so different that I was bored out of my mind,” Keblesh said. “I actually started taking classes again out of boredom.”

Keblesh said after meeting the requirements for an associate’s degree, he decided he was done with school. When a university adviser came to him and told him he was only 10 courses away from a bachelor’s degree, he decided to finish what he started.

Keblesh said when he started taking classes, they were offered in the plant. The first couple of classes he took were taught in conference rooms that were used as classrooms.

“At that time, all classes were scheduled around our shift changes,” Keblesh said. “I could get off work and come to class on my way home.”

Keblesh said he is the type of person who enjoys learning new things, and furthering his education allowed him to get into learning again. Keblesh graduated summa cum laude and received a bachelor’s degree.

“I just went ahead and finished the bachelor’s, and I swore that was going to be the end of it,” Keblesh said. “The next thing I know, I’m signed up for the master’s program.”

In addition to pursuing his master’s degree, Keblesh said as a result of his education, he has begun teaching sheet-metal classes at Stark State College.

Vania Alvarez-Minah, the program officer at the Twinsburg Center, said the Twinsburg Center that operates today developed from the relationship Kent State had with DaimlerChrysler.

“The Twinsburg Center developed slowly,” Alvarez-Minah said. “Classes were first offered about 10 years ago in the building where the Chrysler training center is now.”

When the Chrysler training center opened, the Kent State classes that were offered to Chrysler employees moved there. Students taking these classes continued to consist primarily of Chrysler employees.

Keblesh, who was a student at this time of transition, said it was Gail Gannon, the former coordinator and recruiter at the Twinsburg Center, who began pushing for the courses to be offered to the public.

Since then, the Twinsburg Center has been recruiting both Chrysler employees and public students. The center has grown rapidly in the recent years and the current student population is continually changing.

As the Twinsburg Center grows and develops a more diverse student population, it continues to stay true to its origins, said Shelley Urchek-Geist, an adviser at the center.

“It was put here to start offering the associate’s degree in industrial trades,” Urchek-Geist said. “The other degrees were all started to address the needs of the students.”

The center offers an assortment of associate’s and bachelor’s degrees. These degrees can be completed by taking classes entirely at the center, but students have the option to take classes at any Kent State campus as well.

Although the student population has shifted to more traditional college students, Chrysler employees still make up a portion of the degree-seeking students at the center, Urchek-Geist said.

“Chrysler really pushes training for its employees,” she said.

Jeff Valli is a Chrysler employee currently taking classes at the Twinsburg Center. Valli has been with Chrysler for about 10 years. He decided to take advantage of the opportunity for higher education that Chrysler offers and returned to college last summer.

“I’m a much better student now than when I first graduated high school,” Valli said. “I take it a lot more seriously. I spend a lot more time studying and trying to get good grades, where before I was just trying to get by.”

Valli is taking classes to receive a bachelor’s degree in industrial technology.

As a graduate from the Twinsburg Center, Passick said he is a more rounded person.

“In the auto industry, there is turmoil and job elimination happening all of the time,” Passick said. “It’s not a good feeling knowing you have nowhere else to go if something would happen.

“Now if something would happen, I would pull that degree out, dust it off … I am on much firmer ground with where I stand today because of my bachelor’s degree.”

Contact regional campus reporter Rebekah Mosora at [email protected].