Rio Hondo College Gets Green Light On First Hybrid, Electric Vehicle Degree

WHITTIER (CBSLA.com) — California's first degree in hybrid/electric vehicle/fuel-cell technology will be offered by Rio Hondo College, school officials said Thursday.

Approval for the Associates of Science degree came down from the California Community Colleges Chancellor's Office Wednesday, a 22-day turnaround that school officials said acknowledged the strength of the program, designed by automotive technology veteran John Frala.

To earn their degree in hybrid/electric vehicle and fuel-cell technology, students will need to study electrical systems, chemistry, physics and applied mathematics – all skills needed to work on complex alternative-fuels vehicles.

With about 600,000 hybrid cars and close to 100,000 plug-in electric on California's roads, technicians who can work on these complicated systems are in high demand, Frala said. Representatives from Honda, Toyota, Ford, BYB (an electric bus company based in Lancaster), Tesla and SpaceX have all been calling and visiting the campus to recruit students.

"The jobs are everywhere now for these students, because they have skills that nobody else has," Frala said.