Exchange student now VP at aluminum mill

Twenty years ago, Luis Rodriguez didn’t speak much English and had never seen snow. By the end of his senior year at Columbia Falls High School, his English had much improved, and his friends on the Wildcat soccer team had taken him skiing at Big Mountain.

A lot has happened since then. Rodriguez, who came up from Monterrey, Mexico, for his 20th high school reunion during Heritage Days, has several college degrees, is happily married with two children and is the vice president at a large aluminum mill.

Rodriguez stayed with the Parmenter family as a foreign exchange student. He said they came to Monterrey, a city of 4 million people, in 2003 for his wedding. He recalls all the friendly people in Columbia Falls and has fond memories from his stay here.

“The Parmenters were very warm hosts,” he said.

After graduating from high school, Rodriguez got a bachelor’s in mechanical and industrial engineering at the Monterrey Institute of Technology. After six months working in Aachen, Germany, followed by three years with Johnson Controls and eight years with the Carrier air conditioning company in Monterrey, he got a master’s in business administration at Thunderbird School of Global Management, in Glendale, Ariz., and a master’s in operations management at the University of Nottingham, in the United Kingdom.

Rodriguez has worked for five years at Grupo CUPRUM, an aluminum mill in Monterrey that makes some familiar products to Americans — Black & Decker and DeWalt stepladders as well as structural components for windows, doors and automobiles. He’s been vice president of flat products there for the past two years

He said he planned to stay four days with his best friend from high school, Mark Rogers. During that time, he planned to visit Glacier National Park, attend a high school reunion party, and enjoy the Heritage Days events.

“I’m very excited about seeing my friends from school,” he said.