Here are some tips for selecting schools, based on an analysis comparing each school to all others across dozens of factors:
Schools Concentrating On Automotive Mechanics
- Focus: For schools with a focus on this career area, look at Truman College, Moraine Valley Community College, College of DuPage, and Triton College.
Fastest Response From Schools
- Request Info: For the fastest information for prospective students, look at the Spotlight schools on this page.
Student Body
- Part-Time: For schools emphasizing part-time studies, consider Southern Illinois University Carbondale.
- Diverse: For a diverse student body, consider Kennedy-King College, Morton College, Truman College, and Prairie State.
- Adult Learners: For lots of adult learners, consider John A Logan College, Frontier, Rend Lake College, and Olney Central College.
School Setting
- Out of State: For geographic diversity, take note of Danville Area Community College, Black Hawk, Lewis and Clark Community College, and Southeastern Illinois College.
- Dorms: For a residential campus environment, take note of Southern Illinois University Carbondale.
Excellence
- Class Size: For small class sizes, look at Southern Illinois University Carbondale.
Student/Alumnus Reviews of Schools for This Career and State
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Southern Illinois University • Carbondale, IL
Studying Automotive Mechanics
Automotive Mechanics
Automotive Mechanics
Automotive Technology (completion in 2002)
• 9/29/2011
"If I decide to further my career though education I would return to Southern. I will recommend it to everyone who is seeking an Associate's in Automotive Technology."
Ratings are on a 1-10 scale
| Characteristic | Rating | Comment |
|---|---|---|
| Would Recommend? | yes | I would definitely recommend Southern to friends. This school offers a lot. |
| Program Reputation | 7 | SIUC's automotive tech program has a positive reputation. Employers seek graduates from the program. |
| Program Quality | 10 | SIUC is a great school. They are a leader in automotive technology. |
| Instruction | 7 | The instructors are very helpful. They want all students to succeed. |
| How Difficult | 6 | Some courses were more challenging than others. The instructor took time to explain everything. |
| Hands-On vs. Bookish | The automotive tech program is very hands-on. Students are given plenty of time to use equipment. | |
| Schedule Flexibility | 9 | Most programs are provided to working adults. This allows adults to return to school to advance their career. |
| Academic Facilities | 8 | SIUC has a great facility. The shop has top of the line equipment. |
| Social Life | 5 | SIUC is considered a party school and students have great school spirit. |
| Placement Services | 8 | There are many options available to students to prepare for employment, including resume writing workshops and career fairs. |
| Alumni Network | 8 | SIUC has an excellent alumni network. The alumni association gave out free Chicago Cubs tickets to alumni. |
Southeastern Illinois College • Harrisburg, IL
Studying Basic Automotive Technology (completion in 2009)
• 1/27/2012
"It was not a great program in terms of the necessary hands-on training. The coursework was generalized, and while we had a good instructor, he was handicapped with the limited resources provided to him. I thought I could do so much better once leaving, but the reality of it is that the program did not prepare me as it should have for this career."
Ratings are on a 1-10 scale
| Characteristic | Rating | Comment |
|---|---|---|
| Would Recommend? | no | Considering the difficulty of the field, I would not recommend that school. More should be done to help students break into the field or to guide them to programs/resources where they can expand their skill sets to gain employment. As a trade, it must lead to work, not simple knowledge to retain. |
| Program Reputation | 3 | I have left the state, and it is not well known as an automotive school anywhere else. It is just another school that teaches the basics of a new trade, as far as everyone else seems to think of it. |
| Program Quality | 3 | The school should have taught more and emphasized more hands-on training. Not enough material was covered to really give a solid understanding of the field. |
| Instruction | 3 | The fundamental theories were taught well, but this is a trade that requires hands-on experience. More emphasis should have been paid to repetitive tasks that would lead to real jobs. Also, the machines used were outdated and next to useless at times, for learning how to work with more modern machines in shops today. |
| How Difficult | 5 | It wasn't too hard to learn the material; the pacing was slow enough to allow us to learn it. The workload was probably too light in the hands-on category. |
| Hands-On vs. Bookish | It was more book oriented, as we didn't get our hands on enough variety of vehicles and parts to gain a more fundamental knowledge of them. When all you see is one type of vehicle come in, you don't get to really know much more than fleet service at this point. That isn't good for shops where you are expected to work not only on a variety of models, but also different makes, which are completely different in so many ways. | |
| Schedule Flexibility | 5 | It is pretty standard fare, with courses being offered much like any other college. Night courses would have been a greater value if you wished to expand on the basics, but they were not offered. |
| Academic Facilities | 3 | The materials we learned from were outdated. Not much changes in this field, but enough has changed that it keeps us from being as up to date as we should. The machines were extremely outdated and needed updating to stay current with modern shops. |
| Social Life | 6 | The other students were a good group. We banded together and helped each other out as much as we could. There wasn't much of a "college" life to it, but it was a good experience. |
| Placement Services | 1 | There was no program set up to help us get employment after exiting the program. Information was discussed, including possibilities of where to go try, but that was in-class talk that did not really lead to much. |
| Alumni Network | 1 | There was no after-program support for us. There is no alumni network to use to be able to leverage for contacts in obtaining jobs or references. |
Oakton Community College • Skokie, IL
Studying Automotive (completion in 1981)
• 3/24/2012
"I am always looking to learn more, so it may be that the school was sufficient and I was just looking for more. It was a good program for a technician, but not as good preparation for a business owner."
Ratings are on a 1-10 scale
| Characteristic | Rating | Comment |
|---|---|---|
| Would Recommend? | maybe | As I said, I haven't really kept in touch with the school, so I don't know how the program is today. I don't know that I would feel comfortable recommending it to someone without knowing what it is like. |
| Program Reputation | 5 | I haven't really kept up with the school, so I don't know if they have a good rep or not. I don't think I would recommend them. |
| Program Quality | 7 | I learned a lot regarding the automotive training, but there should have been more as far as the finance or business end of the industry. |
| Instruction | 8 | The instructors were very good with a lot of experience. Most of them had a lot of patience and worked with us to teach us what they could. |
| How Difficult | 5 | I was not really challenged by school and was able to work and go to school. It was a Community College so the studies were adequate but not extremely difficult. |
| Hands-On vs. Bookish | We spent a lot of time in the lab area working on cars, so that was a plus. We had some book time and studied theories and such. | |
| Placement Services | I didn't use their placement system so I cant really say how it was. I found my own jobs. | |
| Alumni Network | 1 | I have never seen or heard from the school again. I kept in touch with a teacher but that was on our own, not through the school. |
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