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Q: Will I learn everything about solar installations? A: Our Boot Camps are designed for two kinds of people:
- Licensed Contractors wanting to add solar as a line of businesses to existing services
- non-Contractors wanting to work in sales, system design, or business operations working with Licensed Contractors to complete installations. For example, we do not teach the skills of licensed Electricians or Roofing contractors, both of which come in handy for solar PV installations. We assume you either already know those skills, or won’t need to know because you will have a Licensed Contractor on your team.
Q: What are the pre-requisites for the Solar PV classes?
A: Students should know basic algebra and geometry: solving simple equations of one variable (e.g. Ohm’s law) and understanding simple trigonometric calculations involving angles and triangles (roofs are triangles!).
Although electrical theory will be briefly reviewed at the beginning of the course, we highly recommend that students review Ohm’s Law and basic series/parallel circuits. A fantastic web site for learning the basics of electric circuit theory is:
http://www.ndt-ed.org/EducationResources/HighSchool/Electricity/electricalcurrent.htm
Interactive Ohm’s Law tutorial: http://micro.magnet.fsu.edu/electromag/java/ohmslaw/index.html
Ohm’s Law sample problems: http://www.physics.uoguelph.ca/tutorials/ohm/Q.ohm.example.ohm.html
http://www.grc.nasa.gov/WWW/K-12/Sample_Projects/Ohms_Law/ohmslaw.html
Q: What support do you provide after the class?
A: Our relationships with dealers, manufacturers, and solar service providers are extended to our alumni, through access to cost-subsidized services which our partners provide as unique incentives to our alumni.
We encourage our students to communicate with us on an ongoing basis after attending our training. Our staff and Instructors are happy to remain a source of information and advice, to the extent that our time outside of class permits. We are also happy to connect you with people, and information relevant to your particular goals after class.
Our goal is to support students as they enter the market with knowledgeable resources for business development, industry connections, continued contact with classmates and instructors, and access to subsidized services like installation service marketing materials, solar project leads, and an open forum to ask the critical questions necessary for progress and development. Our alumni office is ready with the ideas and incite necessary to help push the student forward in the direction of solar success.
Q: Do we take students using the GI Bill?
A: As of 2008, we do not have a blanket enrollment for any student from any state wanting to use GI Bill funds to pay our tuition. We are working with the Veterans Administration in California to get such blanket approval. For now, it is a case-by-case situation, depending on each student’s local VA office and how they chose to work with us.
Q: When I finish this class, will I be certified to do solar installations? A: Every state creates their own standards for the level of certification and/or license which authorizes people to do solar installations. But apart from those state-mandated license requirements, there is no national certification without which someone is prohibited from performing solar installations. Please review our page on State License Requirements .
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