Skyline College may possibly roll out a new ENGR 100 introductory class for the first time in campus history.

Despite having three engineering clubs and many interested students, Skyline currently has no engineering classes. Skyline students must go to sister colleges Cañada and College of San Mateo for engineering classes, making their schedules more sporadic.

Another issue for potential engineers at Skyline, in addition to the commute, is that students will often decide to tackle the courses during their final semester before transferring to a state or private university, resulting in a heavy load of engineering classes without prior experience. Lack of preparation puts students at a disadvantage that could possibly steer them away from pursuing engineering.

Some seek their engineering training outside of the district all together by transferring straight to a state or private university to take the necessary engineering classes. According to Ilkka Koskelo, Skyline physics professor, when a student transfers to a university to take engineering classes; it will be difficult to get into the required classes, and will cost more, putting them in a difficult situation.

“A bad situation is when they arrive and they still have these bottlenecks where they can’t get through their upper division courses because they still have lower division courses to take,” Koskelo said.

He added that the course plan needs to be revised by Oct. 31 to get approval from the curriculum committee by Nov. 5, in order to have the course open to the students as soon as next year’s fall semester. Students interested in engineering could then be provided the course to lead them in the right path towards their field of choice.

“That’s the goal, to start to offer this as soon as we can,” Koseklo said.

According to the Raymond Hernandez, dean of science, technology and math the district hasn’t seen the need for a program to be developed. But a high level of student interest suggests that there is a need for a pathway for engineering across all three campuses.

“Our efforts are really to support the beginning levels of the pathway,” Hernandez said. “We found a need for our student population who cannot go to our sister colleges, at least in the beginning, or at all.”

“Were seeing a lot of students who may take their preparatory courses and transfer either to our sister colleges to take the engineering courses, or in some cases they’re transferring without having taking any engineering specific courses,” Hernandez said.

He added that if it was set in stone that the course were to be available, there are professors in the physics department who are qualified to teach it. There is discussion of providing more than just the introductory course, but it is currently up in the air. Currently, the introductory course is the only one being presented to the curriculum committee, since there is currently a need for it and there must be a certain level of need and interest to get these courses started.

The subject would range from network to civil engineering and many students, such as Henry Perez, are interested. With the possibility of this course of being approved by the curriculum committee, Perez is hopeful at the prospect.

“I think it’s a great idea, considering we are in a close vicinity of the tech world,” Student Henry Perez said.