Hinton Wood Products – West Fraser
Co-op has been a program of personal and professional growth. This has also been an excellent opportunity to learn from the field, connect with individuals in the industry and apply course material and extracurricular experiences. My last 8 month co-op term was with Hinton Wood Products, a division of West Fraser located three hours west of Edmonton. There, I was tasked with a few projects ranging from straightforward projects such as recording daily consumption of a new saw lubricant and comparing it with the old lubricant. More complex projects included providing a payback for a new machinery as this must factor in both advantages and disadvantages with an included monetary value. West Fraser has provided a great deal of support as communication is encouraged to improve any process. Every project requires different approaches to identify and solve the underlying questions. Experiences from four other co-op placements have been able to creatively apply skills and knowledge learned in class within a changing industry environment.
