OAKLAND -- The weight of Alan Harper's winding, yearlong odyssey finally hit him Friday as he spoke at his graduation ceremony.
He had been abruptly laid off by the solar manufacturer Solyndra, then endured the fear and frustration that accompanies prolonged joblessness and finally regained his confidence after completing a rigorous job-training course
The gabby, naturally upbeat Hayward man quickly turned emotional, his eyes moistening and voice quivering, as he congratulated 13 classmates he'd bonded with during Laney College's intensive four-month-long Medical Device Manufacturing Technology Program.
"We all shared that experience of doors shutting on us and just being out there floating," said Harper, 45. "But you all helped me out a lot. We don't have jobs yet, but we're going to."
In fact, three graduates could not attend the on-campus ceremony because they already landed jobs in the biotech and medical device manufacturing fields.
Zelalem Habtamu, another former Solyndra employee, flashed a proud smile at the ceremony. He said his experience has taught him to always adapt to change as fast as possible and to never get comfortable.
"I was comfortable and then the company (Solyndra) shut the door on me," Habtamu said. "It gave me a wake-up call."
Harper, Habtamu and a handful of other ex-Solyndra colleagues started the five-day-per-week course in May. But their journey really began in August 2011, when the Fremont
solar panel company laid off about 1,100 employees without any warning, Harper said.Solyndra's failure was as spectacular as it was surprising. It raised more than $1.1 billion from venture capitalists and received a $535 million loan guarantee from the Department of Energy. But after its sudden implosion last year, it immediately became an infamous symbol of the Obama administration's spotty record on the promise of stimulus spending and green jobs.
For Solyndra workers, the company's abrupt closure hit especially hard because it came during the midst of an economic recession where jobs were already scarce.
"They didn't give us 30 days notice or a severance or any vacation time," Harper said. "They said, 'As of now, you have no health insurance.' It was just a raw deal and, of course, everyone was ticked off."
He said the early morning layoffs turned downright bizarre when Solyndra officials led workers into a poorly lit building the company had leased but never renovated.
"I thought they were going to bring us a cigarette and a blindfold; it was the goofiest thing ever," Harper said. "That's when they said, 'We're out of money and have a nice life.'"
Months went by and Harper experienced life changes -- he moved from Fremont to Hayward and got married. He started doing temp work but his attempts to find full-time job stability were fruitless. He wasn't alone.
The Alameda County Workforce Investment Board -- a Hayward-based agency that provides jobs, training and economic development aid to job-seeking county residents -- reached out to ex-Solyndra employees by placing ads in local newspapers. That effort earlier this year brought 470 job-seekers to the Tri-Cities OneStop Career Center at Ohlone College's Newark campus, said Marybeth McCarthy, a Workforce Investment Board official.
Those agencies put Harper and others in touch with Laney College's manufacturing technology program, a free course led by Professor Naima Azgui that was starting its second session in the spring.
Students, including a former NUMMI factory worker, said they received hands-on training from Azgui and others in the Bay Area's rich biotech fields, including Lindy Vejar from Abbott Medical Optics and Erik Jensen at the California Institute for Quantitative Biosciences.
The Bay Area is the nation's second-leading region for biotech jobs, making medical device manufacturing jobs plentiful, Vejar said.
Joyce Bush, a graduate of the previous year's course and Azgui's assistant, said students should be optimistic because there is no shortage of medical devices, whether it's something as basic as a tongue depressor or more complex apparatus such as blood or DNA analyzers.
At the ceremony, Harper reviewed his experiences from the past year and shared Bush's enthusiasm.
"Don't sell yourselves short," he told his classmates. "In job interviews, be positive, positive, positive. If they ask you if you know how to do something, just say yes, even if you have to Google it later. Because you can do it. You can do it."
Contact Chris De Benedetti at 510-353-7011. Follow him at Twitter.com/cdebenedetti.
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