Surveying Program Seeing Success at Southeast Tech

From keloland.com

SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (KELO) – A program at Southeast Technical College has a reason to celebrate. For the third consecutive year, 100% of students in the Land Surveying Science Technology program have passed their licensure exam, which is higher than the national average. But that’s not all.

Students stepped outside of the classroom recently to do some topographic mapping on the campus of Southeast Technical College.

“What we are doing right now is we are getting the building corners, taking points, and then we will import them into a program and the line work will show up,” student, Carson Popkes said.

The two-year program also has a 100% job placement rate.

Teacher Rod Breitling says a combination of classroom work and hands-on activities are contributing to the success of the program.

“After graduation, most students start off as technicians, they’re going to work under somebody for awhile, and then they can progress up, but survey technicians, engineering staking technicians, CAD work, and then they work up from there,” land surveying science teacher, Rod Breitling said. 

There is a high demand for trained, certified surveyors in the state and region.

For former student, Jo-Hannah Lade, she already had a job lined up before she graduated.

“Right now I work for IMEG Corp out of Sioux Falls and I am currently a field technician, and I do a lot of survey work, I’ve worked with topos, I’m actually going to work on a hydraulic survey after this, and I’ve done a lot of design, and helped with bridge and box culvert design,” graduate Jo-Hannah Lade said.

A program giving students the skills they need for life after graduation.

“It seems like we just found the perfect balance, you do have to cover the material in the classroom, along with preparing the students for their jobs on the first day,” Breitling said.

The program is the state’s only accredited program with the 24 approved land surveying credits required for licensure.