WINTERVILLE (March 26, 2026) – Whether it’s due to a genuine shortage or rampant turnover, truck drivers are in demand. Trucking has been essential to restoring the nation’s post-pandemic supply chain.
And after courses that last just four to 12 weeks and cost $1,180 or less, drivers can emerge from the Commercial Driver’s License program at Pitt Community College to make $50,000, $60,000, $70,000 or later even $100,000 a year.1
“Our goal is to make safe drivers come out of our school program,” says instructor Dorothy Davis, a former over-the-road driver herself.
“We don’t put out bad drivers. You earn your degree here. You earn your CDL,” Davis says.
She notes that Pitt offers weekend classes for students who have weekday jobs.
PITT STUDENT Se’Maj Mitchell says he wants to be a truck driver because his father has driven a truck for 25 years.
“They’re really, really good instructors,” Mitchell says.
“They don’t rush you – they work with you.”
Instructors even bring in a Department of Transportation officer so that students know what to expect when they face inspections on the road, he says.
J.D. Cox, the coordinator of Pitt’s CDL program, notes that it welcomes everyone, especially veterans.
“I would encourage anybody that wants to come out, no matter if you’ve got a little bit of a language barrier or not. We can work with you,” Cox says. “And we fight hard for our students to succeed.”
And the program does count students from multiple ethnicities.
INSTRUCTOR JULIUS Perkins clearly loves his job – even teaching students the harrowing task of backing a tractor-trailer.
“I love the students that come in,” Perkins says. “Some are a little timid, some a little shy.
“But at the end of the program, their faith has increased, their skills have increased, their knowledge has increased,” he says.
And America has a few more well-paid truckers to transport its goods and make its economy move.
1 https://publicedworks.org/2022/06/always-a-demand-for-truck-drivers/.
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