In Torrington, a “Dream Marriage” at Altek

 Ashley Marshall is a graphics student who has been working part-time at Altek Electronics in Torrington since June of 2006.  She has many duties at Altek, mostly related to graphic design.  During my site visit she showed me examples of flowcharts, the graphics for assembly documentation, company flyers, and reproductions of aging blueprints. 

“I take the pictures, and then make them presentable for the assemblies,” said Ashley.  “I scan old blueprints, clean them up, and make them presentable for the assembly process.”She also works on Altek’s website doing updates and posting articles for it.  “Here we use Photoshop, Adobe Acrobat, and Dreamweaver.” 

With us was Matt Kandefer, who is the Document Control Supervisor and Programming Supervisor.  Mr. Kandefer has worked at Altek for the past 8 years. “Ashley enjoys her work, she’s happy to be here, and she always has a smile on her face.  We really rely on her to get the documents done to get them into production,” he said.  “She also puts them into electronic form for us.  She handles the majority of the load.  Ashley is irreplaceable.” 

Matt and Ashley had also teamed together to handle Altek’s presentation table at the annual Technology Fair which is always held at Wolcott Technical School.  “I chose Ashley because she had been here a number of years and knew the products and services we offer, explained Mr. Kandefer.  “The Tech Fair allows us an opportunity to talk with lots of students and we can give them an idea of what is out there.”  “I liked all the kids trying to ask me hard questions,” added Ashley.  “I learned a lot.  I bet it even helps some freshman pick their shops.” 

Later, Ashley told me that Altek owner, Stephen Altshuler, is her next door neighbor.  “I started two summers ago.  I scanned a whole filing cabinet full of old material.  It took the whole summer to finish it.  The coolest thing is, with all the blueprint scanning I do, I go back to the graphics shop and teach it to the kids in our shop.” “WBL definitely works for us,” said Mr. Kandefer.  Not only Ashley, but Tim Davis, our Head Programmer, and Brandon Martinelli, our Process Engineer, are former WBL students from Wolcott Tech.”  I added that Altek always has four or five electronics students on WBL from Mr. Valetta’s Industrial Electronics shop, to help with component assemblies.

Graphics Department Head Mark Eucalitto remarked, “Ashley is a perfect example of what the Technical High School system is all about.  She had on-site training at school using the software that was being used in the industry.  On her own initiative, she found a job in the trade.  It has been a dream marriage for all parties.”

Some samples of her work

Ashley and Matt in front of the Quality Control Board