Diversity, Inclusion and Belonging in the Workplace

Georgian college mentioned "State of the art facilities" when the wood shop was under construction the ENTIRE school year of 2025/2026. Each semester we were told it would be completed by the following semester when it was nowhere near finished each time. I shouldn't have believed them, and I should've got my money back and ran like a couple students did. For safety reasons, student are not allowed to wear clothes with long sleeves or hoods. However, in the winter, there was no heat and fumes would also seep into the shop classroom from the construction zone due to improper separation between the classroom and the working construction zone that was happening on the other side of the door. There was also constant noise from machinery and worker operation which had nothing to do with our class or lessons. The distraction was obvious, but the decibel level also consistently got close to the point of damaging without ear protection. In addition, we were instructed to clean our work areas of dust and debris, which we did. However, there was also construction materials constantly laying on the ground scattered around the shop class such as duct work (ranging from 2' to 8' long and about 2' wide), scaffolding materials, lift trucks, etc. The only instructors in the program who actually seem to care to teach and are Kim, Mike, and Dan when he's not being overworked from picking up the slack of this program (make Dan a fulltime instructor!). Kim and Mike were down to earth, incredibly helpful while also humble, and they were very understanding of people's lives outside of the class/shop. Other instructors would take 40 minutes to an hour each class to explain, re-explain, explain once more, and looove to go over the minutia of what's being explained when there is no need to even mention the minutia. Only to complain that the students aren't getting projects done fast enough. There should also be waaay more instructors for the amount of students in these shop classes. Students can't ask questions to 1 of the 2 instructors without waiting in line for 20-30 minutes while they wait for the instructor to finish answering the other 4 students ahead of them. Which only adds to the time a student is standing around waiting. A smaller class size should also be an option since there was constantly a lineup to use whatever machine is needed for the given workpiece, adding even more time to how much students are waiting around. I truly hope future classes and students have a DRASTICALLY improved experience than I did because I will not be returning to Georgian college for any further education, and I strongly encourage anyone interested in attending Georgian college to get out and see the place for yourself so you don't get misled like I did.

Teachers can be hit or miss. It depends. Some read right from powerpoints, others dive right into things and are open and honest with you and there to help. Some of the classes are not relevant or teach things you were taught earlier, however for the most part, I have learned a lot. Pray you don't get an online course though as those are just the content dumped on the server and you basically teach yourself. I only got one, and thay class was supposed to be in class but was changed due to teacher changes.

As a past student, Georgian isn't what it used to be. Many cutbacks. There is less available for students than there was in 2010 when I was last here. Still, the facilities are great, and the quality of life has been improved for student tech access, although it can be confusing to figure out the websites at first.