DAN: You gonna make it work?
Can't open it.
It's like those toys I get for my kids.
I'm Daniel Burman, I go to Red Rocks Community College,
and I'm 39 years old.
Let's make a motor.
I served about a year and a half in the Marine Corps.
After getting out of the Marine Corps,
I was just waiting tables at a restaurant down in Denver,
just being a snowboard bum.
But as time moved on, I met my wife, decided
to get a real estate license.
I excelled and I actually hold record for the most sales,
most money made in a month.
But I was just never fulfilled.
You wired them correctly.
There was no personal satisfaction, no wow feeling.
Life's too short not to enjoy.
A friend of mine had actually been in the solar industry,
and got into that after taking about two preparatory classes,
decided to go, actually, for their associate's degree
they offer.
Oh, my kid is going to love this.
PROGRAM COORDINATOR: What I want to do is make leads like we have here,
and so we're just adding on leads to this box.
DAN: The degree that I chose
to go with was an associate's degree in Applied
Science for photovoltaics, which is basically changing photons,
which are the sun's rays, into voltage,
which is usable form of energy.
MAN 1: That goes in there.
DAN: That is a positive lead.
OK, gotcha.
The classes there were hands on.
A lot of the electrical classes were really what intrigued me.
If you're going to teach someone a technical type of skill,
I think that you need hands-on training.
So, actually, if you go around the facility here,
you go around the campus, you can
see a lot of the annexes, the labs and all of that
made possible by ATE and the National Science Foundation.
DAN'S BOSS: So what is ATE?
PROGRAM COORDINATOR: Well, ATE is Advanced Technology Education,
and it's funded by the National Science Foundation.
And they authorized funds to be utilized
for many advanced technology programs, and for Red Rocks,
it was approved for Green Jobs Education.
So we develop programs around this
to actually create classes and courses in many areas, which
directly went to green jobs' training,
as we have with Daniel here.
DAN: Since I've been at Red Rocks,
I've seen what these grants and what this has
been able to do for the school.
[FOLKSY MUSIC]
PROGRAM COORDINATOR: This tracks-- it's at perfect STC all day long.
DAN: Certain buildings are actually
completely run by the solar power that they're producing.
And the students who built these arrays
are in their labs and their classes.
PROGRAM COORDINATOR: This also feeds the building next door,
so these two buildings are connected.
DAN: And it's been able to enhance
the experience for any student, including myself,
where you can go to a place and you
can see different forms of this type of renewable energy.
And you're able to actually go and play with it,
and learn about it, touch it, feel it.
DAN'S MENTOR: Daniel had the background.
He had the knowledge.
So yes, he was a first year apprentice on the books,
but with the education that you guys gave him
in the background, he was so much more ahead of the game
than the others.
DAN: Since I've been with Stellar Energy
Contractors, I've been able to use pretty much everything I've
learned at Red Rocks.
We started as a small mom and pop shop.
From there, we decided, you know what?
We're also a roofing company.
Let's try to airseal and insulation.
These are classes I've actually taken at Red Rocks,
so we decided to put our feet into it.
DAN'S BOSS: We ended up adding energy audits and airsealing,
the weatherization steps that he's been taught.
And it seems that every part of the building
envelope that we touch, Daniel has got experience in.
DAN: I've installed well
over 200 solar systems for individuals.
Everything from grid tie to off grid to hybrid systems.
Using all the education that I've actually
gained at Red Rocks Community College,
I was able to completely airseal and insulate my house,
and I built a 4.6 kilowatt solar system on my house
and completely wired and installed it myself.
This house is actually what we consider a net zero house.
This house is actually producing more power than it utilizes.
And this system has saved 19,582 pounds of carbon that
hasn't been put into the air.
My kids are my life along with my wife.
I have two little boys, the two best things I've ever
made in my life and ever will.
To come home every day and know that you're doing good,
and have your child interested in what
you do because you can actually explain to them and show them
is just wonderful feeling.
You know what we should do?
Make a little fire tonight.
Oh.
KID: Can we cook marshmallows?
DAN: Would you like to cook marshmallows?
KID: Yeah.
DAN: You're doing something,
in my opinion, that's truly beneficial for people.
DAN'S WIFE: What's important to me is that Daniel's happy.
He used to be in sales and, you know,
I didn't see that happiness in him
until he started working in solar
and I'm just so proud of him.
And I'm happy that he's happy.
That's what's important to us.
DAN: I love going to work.
It's just an amazing feeling.
To be 39 and be able to proudly say I'm happy about what I do.
As opposed to a lot of people, they work in these jobs
and they're miserable, and they look at everything
as a paycheck.
I look at this as a career.
This is where I want to be, this is what truly makes me happy.
It's an impressive feeling.
I'm definitely grateful to ATE and the National Science
Foundation for allowing people like myself
to be able to change a career, and at my age and my stage
of life being able to give me the tools that I'm going
to need to become a success.