Dear Editor:

I have valued Truck News now for almost two years. Everywhere our Canadian road rangers face rising costs in fuel and repairs, and those lingering and crippling downtime hours.

However, they are not alone in this uphill climb. The truck training centers across Ontario and other provinces also face the slippage due to increased costs and overhead. The struggle to replace professional drivers remains a formidable tasks even on good days. With an ever-growing maelstrom in the manufacturing area, men and women are seeking new opportunities and futures in the transportation field.

A steady stream of potential students hit the pocketbooks of government looking for funding to offset the rising cost of training. This significant and steady stream of potential students don’t realize the maze that they are entering.

This is a profession that requires constant vigilance, for the highways are rising in congestion, road rage, and hours spent at border crossings.

Truck training at bonded, regulated, and authorized Private Career Colleges (PCC) is available almost around the clock. Men and women take pride in preparing themselves to pass on the information and skills that will send the next generation of truckers across this wide expanse called North America.

The hours are long, the remuneration is not necessarily fixed to knowledge, and may change with student enrolments, student funding capabilities, or just plain competition. We are those men and women in the shadows of carriers seeking new drivers and new recruiting techniques.

The average age of A/Z drivers is now between 42 and 45 years of age. Many leave the industry, for whatever reason, but the shortages persist and the preparation for replacement continues unabated.

Noted in the struggle is an advancing awareness of community colleges who vie for the opportunity to offer professional driver training in their curriculums. The path for training schools becomes smaller, with the onset of government regulations through the PCC.

If the Truck Training Schools Association of Ontario (TTSAO) is given a larger mandate to work with the PCC more completely, then maybe there is a chance for registered schools to come to the aid of the industry, in a recognized fashion.

How can such a school get authorization, without conforming to the ministry regulations? I thought the ‘old west’ vigilantes which took the law in their own hands were gone. But still we hear of schools popping up literally alongside the highway.

Either the application form is flawed or the number of officers to enforce the regulations is deplorably low. Anyway, true, honest, and hard-working schools are doing their part to turn out welltrained graduates who act as ambassadors for their respective schools.

Together, the highway will have its need met, thanks to good schools provided through the TTSAO, and not through government officials, who are understaffed to do the work.

Donald W. Nantais Danbro Truck Training Hamilton, Ont.